230 SPARKS FROM A GEOLOGIST'S HAMMER. 



While the whole eastern shore of Lake Michigan enjoys 

 the combined advantages of lake influence, and peculiar 

 arrangement in the prevailing direction of the wind, 

 there seemed to be still another expedient by which these 

 advantacres could be enhanced and distributed over a wider 

 belt. There is a singular, and, one could almost believe, 

 providential, conformation of this shore of the lake which 

 greatly augments its ameliorating influence on climate, 

 and, at the same time, creates important facilities for 

 shipment and transportation of the products of the soil. 

 Anj'one looking at an ordinanj map of Lake Michigan 

 would at once conclude that the rigid continuity of the 

 coast-line excluded the possibility^ of all harbor accommo- 

 dations from Chicago to Grand Traverse Bay. It is true 

 that we find few harbors in a state of preparation for 

 occupancy; but it is a singular and interesting and most 

 important fact that there is not a stream, however small, 

 emptying into Lake Michigan from the east which does 

 not first discharge its waters into a small lake which 



O 



communicates almost immediately with Lake Michigan. 

 Looking at a representation of this hydrographic singu- 

 larity, one can hardly resist the fanc}^ that we have here 

 a real litter of lakelets nestling alongside of the great 

 maternal lake. These babv lakes are bodies of clear 

 water, with clean, sandy shores, and abound in delicate 

 fish. Toward the north they contain the speckled trout 

 in abundance, while many of the streams which debouch 

 through them are stocked with that game-fish whose 

 pursuit is so exhilarating to anglers, the " grayling," first 

 described from the waters Michigan. We find over thirty 

 of these lakelets between St. Joseph and Little Traverse 



