Externally, the day was fine and warm, and so we found the cave comparatively dry, only one drop falling in a minute on to the stone where ninety-six had fallen in the same time the day before.

The thermometer registered 32 deg.

as the greatest cold of the night, and still stood at that point when we took it up.
We spent some little time in exploring the neighbourhood of the pits, in order to find, if possible, the outlet for the drainage, but the ground did not fall away sufficiently for any source from so low an origin to show itself.

The search was suggested by what I remembered of the Glaciere of S.Georges three years before, where the people believe that a small streamlet which issues from the bottom of a steep rock, some distance off, owes its existence to the glaciere.
FOOTNOTES: [Footnote 1: In this neighbourhood, the _montagne_ of any _commune_ is represented by the feminine form of the name of the village: thus, _L'Arziere_ is the _montagne_ of Arzier, and _La Bassine_ of Bassin.
This has a curious effect in the case of some villages--such, for instance, as S.Georges--one of the landmarks of the district between the lakes of Joux and Geneva being the _Chalet de la S.Georges_, a grammatical anomaly which puzzles a stranger descending the southernmost slope of the Jura from the Asile de Marchairuz.

This law of formation is not universal; for the _montagnes_ of Rolle and S.Livres are called the _Pre de Rolle_ and the _Pre de S.Livres_, while the _Fruitiere de Nyon_ is the rich upland possession of the town of that name.] [Footnote 2: Probably a relic of the time when the earlier Barons of Coppet possessed this district.