ON THE GEOLOGICAL AGENCY OF THE WINDS. 223 



mer periods, more abundant rains than they now have. Where 

 did the vapor for those rains come from ? and what has stopped 

 the supply ? Surely not the elevation or depression of the Dead 

 Sea basin. 



619. My reasearches with regard to the winds have suggested 

 the probability (§ 172) that the vapor which is condensed into 

 rains for the lake valley, and whicli the St. Lawrence carries off 

 to the xltlantic Ocean, is taken up by the southeast trade-winds 

 of the Pacific Ocean. Suppose this to be the case, and that the 

 winds which bring this vapor arrive with it in the lake country at 

 a mean dew-point of 50°. This would make the southwest winds 

 the rain winds for the lakes generally, as well as for the ]\Iissis- 

 sippi Valley ; they are also, speaking generally, the rain winds of 

 Europe, and, I have no doubt, of extra-tropical Asia also. 



620. Now suppose a certain mountain range, hundreds of miles 

 to the southwest of the lakes, but across the path of these winds, 

 were to be suddenly elevated, and its crest pushed into the regions 

 of snow, having a mean temperature at its summit of 30° Fah- 

 renheit. The winds, in passing that range, would be subjected 

 to a mean dew-point of 30° ; and, not meeting (§ 196) with any 

 more evaporating surface between such range and the lakes, they 

 would have no longer any moisture to deposit at the supposed lake 

 temperature of 50° ; for they could not yield their moisture to any 

 thing above 30°. Consequently, the amount of precipitation in the 

 lake country would fall off ; the winds which feed the lakes would 

 cease to bring as much water as the lakes now give to the St. 

 Lawrence. In such a case, that river and the Niagara would drain 

 them to the level of their bed ; evaporation would be increased by 

 reason of the dryness of the atmosphere and the want of rain, and 

 the lakes would sink to that level at which, as in the case of the 

 Caspian Sea, the precipitation and evaporation would finally be- 

 come equal. 



621. There is a self-regulating principle that would bring about 

 this equality ; for as the water in the lakes becomes lower, the 

 area of its surface would be diminished, and the amount of vapor 

 taken from it would consequently become less and less as the sur- 

 face was lowered, until the amount of water evaporated would be- 



