One of
these was 11 inches deep, from the heel to the rock, and only one-eighth
of an inch thick at the thickest part.
The angle occupied by the cascade or column was the most striking. The
base of the column was large, and apparently solid, like a smooth
unbroken waterfall suddenly frozen. It fitted into the angle of the
cave, and completely filled up the space between the contiguous walls. I
commenced to chop with my axe, and before long found that this ice was
hollow, though very thick; and when a sufficient hole was made for me to
get through, I saw that what had looked like a column was in truth only
a curtain of ice hung across the angle of the cave. Within the curtain
the ice-floor still went on, streaming down at last into a fissure
something like that in the other corner. The curtain was so low, that I
was obliged to sit on the ice inside to explore; and after a foot or two
of progress, the slope towards the fissure became sufficiently great
to require steps to be cut. The stream of ice turned round a bend in the
fissure, very near the curtain, and was lost to view; but Rosset stood
by the hole through which I had passed--on the safer side of it--and
despatched blocks of ice, which glided past me round the corner, and
went whizzing on for a long time, eventually landing upon stones, and
sometimes, we fancied, in water.
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