Connecticut River Valley. 217 
and diffused in the first large lake of the Connecticut. Some part of 
the materials thus accumulated then subsided, and compose the pres- 
ent plains and meadows of that-basin. | Other portions were borne 
through the lake, and over its rocky barrier, contributing to the plains 
of lower basins, or passing onward to Long Island Sound; as is seen 
at the present day, in the turbid waters of our annual floods. A 
proof as well as consequence of such a mode of accumulation,ex- 
ists in the general fineness of the earth, of which plains and meadows 
are composed. Loose rocks and fragments are no more frequent 
than may be accounted for, by tributary streams thrusting forward the 
coarser contents of their beds, or outbreaking in new channels—the 
falling of insulated peaks, such as are seen cutting through and ri- 
sing above the plains—and occasional transportation of rocky frag- 
ments, by ice floating from the hill sides. 
The lakes become a river.—It may be inferred, from the level sur- 
face of the plains, that the lakes in which they were formed were 
filled with earth before, perhaps long before, the barriers gave way— 
that the lakes disappeared, and a river flowed through the full plains, 
wearing away on one side, and casting up the earth in eddies on the 
other, as at this day among the meadows—that what is now the 
plain was once meadow. Hence the sweeping curves and regul: 
slopes of the faces of the plains. When a barrier gave way, the 
river would deepen its channel throughout the whole extent of such 
a plain. ‘There is no such thing in nature as a rapid stream, running 
upon a pe of clay or sand. Currents seize the finer earth with 
which they come in contact, bearing it along, until thrown aside into 
some eddy, or meeting with other tranquil waters, it is again deposi- 
ted. Hence when, by the breach of a barrier, the river took pos- 
sesion of a.deeper bed at the outlet of the basin, its channel through 
the whole extent of alluvial plain, would be deepened in like propor- 
tion. ‘Thus the lakes disappeared, leaving Connecticut river in their 
stead. 
Action of the river.—During the formation of its deeper channel, 
the river acquires new power of undermining and wearing away its 
banks, as yet unprotected by turf or trees. At Northampton and 
Wethersfield, the Connecticut within the memory of man, has re- 
moved its bed eighty rods, by wearing down the banks on one side, 
and throwing them up in eddies on the other. Similar laws of ac- 
tion operated in ancient times, and on the levels of the plains. In 
this manner were probably caused, not only the sweeping curves 
aes 
