Half-way down the slope the ice commenced, fitfully at first, and afterwards in a tolerably continuous sheet.

The most careless explorer could not have failed to notice the polygonal figures stamped upon its surface.

They were larger and bolder than any I had seen before; and the prismatic nuts into which the ice broke, when cut with the axe, were of course in proportion larger than in the previous caves.

The signs of thaw, too, were unmistakeable.
Though the upper surface of the earth had seemed to be utterly devoid of moisture of any kind, large drops fell freely from the roof of the cave,[97] and the ice itself was wet.

The _patron_ said there was no ice whatever in the winter months, and that from June to September was the time at which alone it could be found.