72 Kansas Academy of Science. 



to subdue Nature, intelligence evolved in developing and applying science to industry, 

 culture was inwrought and polished manners ground out by tlie attrition of society, and 

 art was engendered by the luxuries which Nature oflers to those who hang over with 

 delight and feast upon landscapes. During our civil strife, the love of liberty was found 

 strongly intrenched in the mountainous districts of West Virginia, North Carolina and 

 East Tennessee. 



It is the purpose of this paper to inquire, What has Nature done for the higher devel- 

 opment of the dwellers on the great central plains of the North American continent? 



In wealth and variety of soil the great plains are justly celebrated. Nothing can 

 exceed the depth and fertility of the alluvial deposits. The cereals of the temperate 

 zone grow with almost spontaneity. Tiie sacred phrase has its counterpart, a thousand 

 cattle on a hill. With mineral resources Nature has stored her secret chambers. The 

 ofl'ering.s of grains and fruits and flowers are in profusion. But what keeps a people living 

 amidst such luxuries from indolence and retrogradation ? 



Among Nature's opposing forces may be placed river bluff's, an American term applied 

 to cliffs or high banks overhanging streams. The river bluffs constitute an important 

 element in the pliysical features of the West. The Mississippi river and its numerous 

 and powerful affluents nearly always flow between these blufls, rising in places as massive 

 walls, and sloping back sometimes for miles from the river on either side with decreasing 

 undulations, and melting away at last in the level prairie. Counting both banks, this 

 system of rivers alone would give a single line of elevations meandering through the 

 great plains something like twenty thousand miles in length, and rising at some points 

 to a height above the river of five hundred feet. 



The geology of the river bluffs unfolds itself on the following dynamic principles. In 

 an open country like the prairies, rivers possess two elements — a channel, and a ffood- 

 plain. During the winter season, and some months in summer, the stream is confined 

 within the channel. But during freshets, and particularly the June freshet, which is 

 swollen by mountain snows, the stream rises and spreads over the flood-plain. Now 

 should the interior of the continent be elevated say a hundred feet by internal forces, the 

 coast-line remaining the same, the river would have a greater fall, quicker flow, and 

 more eroding power. A new channel and a new flood-plain would be cut, both of less 

 width, leaving the outer margins of the old flood-plain as an elevated terrace. And the 

 walls of the original geological suture, or outer banks of the stream, would be left by 

 the receding water to be elevated by such successive epochs into river bluffs. And the 

 partings or lips of any suture in the original crust would be slightly turned up by escap- 

 ing steam or gases, or outward pressure of the yielding mass beneath, leaving the bluff" 

 elevated above the surrounding prairie. Four such elevations have taken place since 

 the rivers of the eastern portion of the continent began to ffow, and three since the Mis- 

 sissipx>i began to pursue its course toward the Gulf. As the geological elevation has been 

 greatest toward the interior and western portions of the continent, the eroding power of 

 rivei-s has proportionally increased, causing the river bluflTs to become more prominent 

 as physical features of the country as we ascend the rivers, just as we shall see where 

 they are needed. 



The meteorology of the river bluffs is an important element to those dwelling on the 

 great plains. People always living among hills crowned with forests do not realize the 

 force or constancy of the winds in a level prairie country. At Lawrence, Kansas, for 

 example (a place not exposed as much as many points farther west ), the self-registering 

 anemometer on the University building, situated on Mount Oread, furnishes the follow- 

 ing record: During the year 1875 the wind traveled 145,316 miles, which gives a mean 

 daily velocity of over 398 miles, and an hourly velocity of over 16 miles. These total 

 winds, flowing uniformly over the whole year, would give the people of Lawrence a con- 

 stant current of air between a fresh breeze and a strong wind. On January 8, 1875, at 



