“Catholic Press (Sydney, NSW : 1895 – 1942), Thursday 18 May 1911, page 4
GRAVE NEWS ABOUT GLACIERS.
Glaciers are part of the romance of mountains; the very name gives the thrill of the lonely and high and awful even to those who are not quite sure what a glacier may be. There is grave news about glaciers; they are disappearing, it would seem. Swiss peasants who are not yet quite all modernised enough to think toy railways in harmony with the eternal hills, declare that the tourists who go to see the glaciers are the cause of the ruin. Wherever the mountain cars run the glaciers flee. A Kandersteg correspondent of the “Morning Post” gives some dreary particulars. For many years past exact observations have been taken of the movements of glaciers in the Alps. The results of last year’s records have just been published, and show that all the glaciers in the Rhone district of Switzerland are in retreat, some of them to an extent which may almost be described as alarming. For example, the Arolla glacier has receded 85ft. in the past 12 months; the Aletsch, the longest in the Alps, 65 feet; the Gorner glacier, 58 feet; the Zinal, 51 feet; while the Turtmann glacier, in the Zermatt range, and the Zanfleuren or Sanetsch glacier have retreated nearly 46 feet each. Within the last ten years the Zigiornuovo glacier has shrunk by as much as 904 feet, the Zanfleuren by 718 feet, the Aletsch by 459 feet, the Zinal by 378 feet, and the Gorner by 190 feet. Others all showed more or less shrinkage. In the short space of four years, moreover, the small Mont Bonvin glacier, in the Wildstrubel range, Bernese Oberland, has entirely disappeared from sight. Another glacier, the Plaine Morte, in the same region of the Alps, has revented a little lake in the course of its receding. It is clear that if any Australian hasn’t seen a glacier yet, he had better take the next boat.”
