The Hispar Glacier 1

Abstract

DR. AND MRS. BULLOCK WORKMAN, the well-known explorers of the higher Himalayas, have read before the Royal Geographical Society a most interesting account of the Hispar Glacier. This is one of a group of four of the world's greatest mountain-glaciers, which, together with two others of them—the Biafo and the Chogo Lungma—and some of their tributaries, have been explored from end to end by these indomitable climbers. The Hispar Glacier, one of the many feeders of the Indus, occupies a long and nearly straight valley, running roughly parallel with the crest of the Karakoram—one of the watersheds of Asia. Here that is gashed by rather short and steep transverse valleys, altogether nine in number, and attains an elevation often exceeding 20,000 feet above sea-level. On the southern side is another mountain wall, not quite so lofty, though even its lowest point is quite a thousand feet above the summit of Mont Blanc. From its western part—rather more than fifteen miles in extent—six tributary glaciers—three of them large—descend to the Hispar, but its eastern and upper portion—fully twenty-one miles in length—is practically unbroken. A rather long and flat snow saddle, 17,500 feet above sea-level, parts the Hispar from the Biafo Glacier, which descends towards the south-east, and the total length of the former, from its termination near Hispar village, at a height of about 11,000 feet above sea-level, is, according to Dr. Workman's measurement, a little less than thirty-seven miles, or a mile and a half greater than that assigned to it by Drs. Calciati and Koncza.