56 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY. 



these salt basins. Some have regarded them as of little value and 

 incapable of supplying brine in quantity sufficient to make it pos- 

 sible to compete with the great salt-producing sections of Mich- 

 igan and New York; others again have placed an extravagant 

 value on them, representing them as capable of building up 

 princely fortunes for any who are fortunate enough to possess the 

 capital to work them. The truth is probably somewhere between 

 these extremes. If the salt water that flows away and is lost were 

 placed in reservoirs and evaporated by solar heat, a richly remu- 

 nerative business could be built up. Sooner or later this will be 

 done. When the artesian well on the Government Square in Lin- 

 coln reached a depth of 560 feet, there was a heavy flow of salt 

 water to the surface. The salt water, however, had been struck 

 long before, but it did not flow out. The salt-giving rock is the 

 reddish, porous sandstone that lies between seventy and two hun- 

 dred and fifty-five feet in depth. It is because this artesian well 

 \vas sunk down over a thousand feet and came in contact with 

 many other strata of rock containing different kinds of water, that 

 the flow now embraces so many different chemical elements An- 

 other artesian well had previously been bored on the north s'de of 

 the main salt basin. This one struck a flow of salt water at about 

 the same depth as the one on the Government Square. There is 

 some uncertainty in the mind of Mr. Eaton, who made the borings 

 in Lincoln, whether the " great flow " was produced by salt water, 

 or whether the fresh water that was then struck simply combined 

 with and forced out the salt water. All the known facts, however, 

 go to support the view that salt water is here abundant, and only 

 needs to be properly handled to make it a most profitable industry. 

 There are also saline springs and lakelets beyond and near the 

 head of the Elkhorn and Loup rivers, and at long intervals toward 

 the northwestern corner of the State on tributaries of the Niobrara 

 flowin^ from the south. I visited these under such unfavorable 



> 



circumstances for investigation, that I am not prepared to report 

 on their extent or probable value. 



THE RIVERS OF NEBRASKA 



are distinguished for their breadth, their number, and some of them 

 for their rapiditity and depth. In fact, the name of Nebraska means 

 land of broad rivers. 



Chief of all, not only of Nebraska, but of the United States, is the 

 Missouri, because it gives character to all the rivers that unite with 



