4 INTRODUCTORY. 



coast lines of the continents of the earth, as witness the northwest coast 

 lines of America, Europe and Africa, and the southeast coast lines of 

 South America, Africa and Asia. 



GENERAL FEATURES. 



Parallel also with this coast line trend the divisions between the various 

 geolo<>ical formations of the State. First, extending not more than ten miles 

 inland, we have the strata of the post pleiocene resting on the formations 

 of the eocene. These, with here and there a patch of the. meiocene and 

 cretaceous formations, stretch back into the interior about one hundred 

 miles, until they reach the crystalline rocks, whose well marked line has, 

 during the entire past history of the State, divided it socially, politically 

 and industrially, as well as physically, into M^hat has always been known 

 as the up-country and the low-country of Carolina. This division of the 

 State into up-country and low-country by the line bounding the .southern 

 margin of the crystalline rocks, and trending northeast and southwest 

 across its central portion, is strongly marked in everything, in the hills 

 and highlands of the up-countr}', with their heavy red clay soils, and in 

 the gentle slopes or Avide flats of lighter colored sandy loam of the low- 

 country, in the rapid, turbid water courses of the one, and the slow, clear 

 currents of the other; in the vegetable growth, the chestnut, the deciduous 

 oaks and the short leaf pine, occupying the up-country, and the long leaf 

 pine, the magnolia and the evergreen oaks, with the long gray moss, 

 marking the. low-country ; and lastly, in the manners, character, ancestry, 

 and even in the very tones of voice of the inhabitants. Passing beyond 

 the lower margin of the crystalline rocks and proceeding towards the 

 mountains, we find in all the various strata — in the order of their super- 

 position — one above the other, the limestones, the itacolumite, the clay 

 talc and mica slates, the gneiss and the granite — that the same parallel- 

 ism is maintained throughout, the prevailing strike in all being N. 20° to 

 30° E. if we regard tlie movements of the atmosphere, we find here also 

 that the predominating currents of the air move in a northeasterly and 

 southwesterly direction. 



RIVERS. 



Perpendicular to this direction — that is to say, in a southeasterly 

 course — the four great rivers, with their numerous tributaries that drain 

 and irrigate South Carolina, make their way from the mountains to the 

 .sea. Before leaving the crystalline rocks — the point that marks their 

 lower falls and the head of steam navigation — the rivers have received 

 the rapid currents of nearly all their aftluents. Thereafter their stately 



