199 



From f to y, Fig. A, is a baiTen bluff and gives evidence of tlie river 

 bed's gradual southward movement, but at y (enlarged section of wliicb is 

 found in Fig. B) tbe westward movement of both bed and bluff is quite 

 marlied. Within the time of my own observation, I am certain that from 

 twelve to fifteen feet of the bluff, which is some fifty feet in height, has 

 disappeared. A year ago a mass of earth (see g in Fig. D) 6x8x30 feet 

 dropped down five feet at the north end, but still clings to the surface at 

 the south end. It is rapidly yielding to the elements, and two years 

 hence no trace of it will remain. As this bluff moves westward the one 

 at X is moving eastward at about the same rate of speed. Thus in the 

 course of two thousand years will occur a phenomenon rarely found on 

 this stream, i. e., a waterfall or rapid— a fall of thirteen feet in one thous- 

 and, and possibly a canyon, also. 



Yet there will still remain enough bend to renew the northward move- 

 ment of the channel and in time the highland of the "Heiney Bend" will 

 disappeai'— the stream will bend far to the north— the bottom lands will 

 lie south of the stream, with the adjoining bluff of the river on its north 

 bank. The newly formed bottom lands will lie much lower than those of 

 the "Sheet Bend" at present. 



Now let us leave the present and future of the stream and go back 

 to its past. Following the old bed as indicated by its right bank (the 

 dotted line, pq, in Fig. A, and p'. Fig. B), and taken in x'elation with 

 some sink holes (o in Fig. A and o' in Fig. B), along the foot of the 

 ridge, it is evident that the old bed crossed its present bed at p and q, 

 and that the "Shutt Bend," which is extending itself southward, was once 

 much smaller than now. This bend has been greatly eroded. It is consid- 

 erably lower than its neighbor on the west, the south part of the "Heiney 

 Bend," and as a consequence does not bear the remains of as ancient 

 river beds as the latter. In Fig. B, I have endeavored to show the low 

 places in the surface by shortening the lines which indicate the bluffs and 

 ridges; thus r' and s' correspond with the dotted lines r and s in Fig. A, 

 and doubtless locate the successive channels of the river before it settled 

 down between the ridges and bluffs which bound its present immediate 

 basin, or what the farmers term the "first bottom," more generally recog- 

 nized as the "lower terrace." From the present topography it is certain 

 that after the river left its channel, r, and before it took its present gen- 

 eral course between the ridges, it crossed at s, and again at h. A far 



