ice--the
end of a glacier--which fills the Rhone valley, and from the bottom of
the glacier the river rushes. In the glacier of the Rhone you thus find
the source of the river Rhone.

But whence come the glaciers? Wherever lofty mountains, like the Alps,
rise into the high parts of the atmosphere where the temperature is
below the freezing-point, the vapour condensed from the air falls upon
them, not as rain, but as snow. In such high mountainous regions, the
heat of the summer melts the snow from the lower hills, but the higher
parts remain covered, for the heat cannot melt all the snow which falls
there in a year. When a considerable depth of snow has accumulated, the
pressure upon the lower layers squeezes them into a firm mass, and after
a time the snow begins to slide down the slope of the mountain. It
passes downward from one slope to another, joined continually by other
sliding masses from neighbouring slopes, until they all unite into one
long tongue, which creeps slowly down some valley to a point where it
melts. This tongue from the snow-fields is called a glacier.

Without solar fire, therefore, we could have no atmospheric vapour,
without vapour no clouds, without clouds no snow, and without snow no
glaciers. Curious then as the conclusion may be, the cold ice of the
Alps has its origin in this heat of the sun.

Tyndall: "The Forms of Water."
(Adapted)

For what are men better than sheep or goats
That nourish a blind life within the brain,
If, knowing God, they lift not hands of prayer
Both for themselves and those who call them friend?

Tennyson

FITZ-JAMES AND RODERICK DHU

The Chief in silence strode before,
And reached that torrent's sounding shore,
Which, daughter of three mighty lakes,
From Vennachar in silver breaks,
Sweeps through the plain, and ceaseless mines
On Bochastle the mouldering lines,
Where Rome, the Empress of the world,
Of yore her eagle wings unfurled.
And here his course the Chieftain staid,
Threw down his target and his plaid,
And to the Lowland warrior said--
"Bold Saxon! to his promise just,
Vich Alpine has discharged his trust.
This murderous Chief, this ruthless man,
This head of a rebellious clan,
Hath led thee safe, through watch and ward,
Far past Clan-Alpine's outmost guard.
Now, man to man, and steel to steel,
A Chieftain's vengeance thou shalt feel.