GIROUARD
GLACIERS
partment. Early in 1792 Louis XVI was compelled to form a Girondist ministry, but soon dismissed them, a measure which led to the insurrection of June 20, 1792. The Jacobins soon after gained the leadership, and, although the Girondists tried to save the king's life, it was impossible. The fall of their leader, Roland, and the ascendancy of Robespierre followed; and, soon after, many of the members were arrested, tried and sentenced to death by the Mountain, as the extreme party was called. On their way to the place of execution they sang the Marseillaise. Sixteen months later the remaining outlawed members returned to the convention.
Girouard, Hon. Desire, born and educated in the Province of Quebec. A graduate in law of McGill University. A successful practitioner and writer on legal and historical topics. More than any other writer he has thrown light on the early history of the Island of Montreal. He was first elected to the House of Commons in 1874 and became an influential member. He was appointed judge of the Supreme Court in 1895, a position which he still holds. Sir Percy Girouard of the Royal Engineers, who has won distinction as a member of Lord Kitchener's staff, is his son.
Glace Bay is a rapidly growing city on Cape Breton Island, fifteen miles by rail from Sydney, with a fine beach. Its 2,459 inhabitants in 1891 were increased to 6,945 in 1901 by the development of the extensive coal mines.
Glaciers. Glaciers are streams or sheets of slowly moving land-ice. They are developed from great accumulations of snow.
GLACIER OF ZERMATT, SWITZERLAND
The processes by which snow is converted into ice are somewhat complex. One factor in the change is the pressure due to the weight of the snow itself. This tends to convert the lower portion of a field of snow into ice. Again, the surface snow of a snow-field is subject to melting during the sunny days of summer, and the water, sinking beneath the surface, may freeze
again. In freezing, it not only becomes ice, but tends to bind the snow where it freezes into a solid mass. The ice of glaciers is in more or less distinct layers, some Of which are bluer and more compact than others. Since glaciers are formed from large accumulations of snow, it follows that they are found only where conditions are such as to allow the accumulation of snow in large quantities.
When the ice in a snow-field becomes sufficiently thick, movement begins. The exact nature of the motion is somewhat uncertain, but the results are such as they would be if the ice flowed like an extremely viscous fluid. The ice is, however, so brittle as to break under tension, and crevasses are formed where the ice moves over considerable irregularities of bed, and in some other circumstances. The rate of motion is very slow, usually varying in glaciers which have been studied from a few inches to a few feet a day. Once in motion, the ice moves forward and downward until it reaches a position where melting balances forward motion.
Glaciers occur in high altitudes in all latitudes and in all altitudes in high latitudes. There are various types of glaciers, chief among which are (i) narrow valley-glaciers like those of Switzerland, called alpine glaciers, and (2) broad ice-sheets like that of Greenland. Glaciers of the alpine type abound in many high mountains. The best known are in Switzerland and Scandinavia, but alpine glaciers also occur in the Pyrenees, the Caucasus, the Himalayas and the Tien Shan Mountains, in the Cordilleras of the western part of North America, in the Andes of South America and in the high mountains of some other parts of the world. The Alps alone harbor more than 1,000 glaciers, most of which are very small, the largest (the Aletsch) being scarcely more than ten miles long. Glaciers are numerous in the northwestern part of the United States, especially in the Cascade Range. Though the glaciers of this region have never been enumerated, there certainly are many hundreds, probably thousands of them. Glaciers occur in the Sierras as far south as central California. They abound in the Cordilleras north of the United States, and are found on some of the higher mountains of Mexico. The best-known ice-sheet is that of Greenland, which has an estimated area of between 300,000 and 400,000 square miles. The most extensive ice-sheet is that of Antarctica, the area of which perhaps is ten "times as great as that of the ice-sheet of Greenland.
One ice-sheet may give rise to many glaciers about its borders, as in the case of the Greenland ice-sheet; or glaciers from small ice-sheets may unite to form a single glacier as in many mountain regions.
