METEORIC RIVERS OR WATERFALLS. 403 



The following letter from Professor Park, of the Univer- 

 sity of Pennsylvania, is interesting, in connection with the 

 subject of Meteoric Rivers. 



PHILADELPHIA, October 5, 1838. 

 JAMES P. ESPY, Esq. 



DEAR SIR, In answer to your inquiries concerning the 

 slides or washes of the White Mountains, which I have re- 

 cently visited, I would unhesitatingly state my conviction, 

 that they are produced, not hy abrasion from the ordinary 

 falling of rain, but by very sudden and copious discharges 

 of water falling collectively from the clouds or regions of 

 the air. Many of these washes commence so near the brow 

 of the mountain, that there is no space above for the rain to 

 accumulate, to produce such enormous effects. Neither do 

 I think that the water could have been obstructed or dam- 

 med up on those steep slopes, so as to have acquired suffi- 

 cient head and momentum to carry all before it, earth, 

 rocks and trees, in one mighty deluge. A river falling from 

 the clouds with resistless force, could alone account to me 

 for such effects, and I believe this is the opinion of those 

 writers who visited there soon after the melancholy disaster 

 of 1826, when the Willey family were whelmed in an un- 

 timely grave. There are not less than thirty or forty of 

 these slides on the west side of the Mount Washington 

 range; but my remarks apply more especially to those on 

 each side of the Notch, further south and east, which are 

 much more numerous. Every thing is swept away there, 

 down to the solid rock, even close to the summits, and 

 where there is no basin above or behind to collect the fall- 

 ing waters. Very respectfully, yours, 



ROSWELL PARK. 



