RICE COUNTY. (;(J5 



Cannon river terraces.] 



quarry, and southwestward from there, having an elevation of 1090 feet above the sea, may have 

 been deposited by the Straight river, as already mentioned, or by direct drainage from the wast- 

 ing surface of the ice at the time of accumulation of the moraine in Walcott township. 



The luircr terrace, that on which the city of Faribault stands, is much 

 more constant and conspicuous. At Faribault its elevation is 1002 feet, 

 and forty-three feet above the river. At Warsaw it is 1007, and thirty-four 

 feet above the river. At Morristown it is 1008, and about fourteen feet 

 above the river. Below Faribault there are conspicuous morainic accumu- 

 lations of gray till accompanied with considerable gray gravel that rise in 

 the midst of this gravel terrace on the west side of the river; and on the 

 east side it is quite narrow or entirely wanting. Through a valley in this 

 rolling till area the Milwaukee road passes northward, after leaving the 

 gravel plain at Faribault, the highest part of which valley has a natural 

 surface 1047 feet above the sea, though the till itself rises in many places 

 above 1 100 feet. The Cannon valley railroad also follows a low spot through 

 this moraine. Both roads re-appear on the gravel terrace, the former in 

 sec. 13, Wells, and the latter in sec. 8, Cannon City, where it is approxi- 

 mately 975 feet above the sea. Again on sees. 33 and 27, Bridgewater, this 

 plain is separated from the present river channel by extensive accumula- 

 tions of till, whose hight, however, is not wholly due to an increase of the 

 drift, but partly to the preservation of the St. Peter sandstone and the 

 Trenton limestone. At a mile above the mouth of Wolf creek the river 

 re-enters its old valley, and is skirted by the deposits of this terrace espe- 

 cially on the east side of the river, between Dundas and Northn'eld. The 

 strike of the Shakopee, with its boggy bench, is introduced conspicuously 

 at and below Dundas, disturbing the course of this gravel terrace, and 

 introducing a lower terrace on each side, between which latter the river 

 continues to the county line. At Dundas the real valley is about two miles 

 wide, with gravel flats on both sides. 



Gravel is spread over the lower prairies, at about an elevation of 950 feet, in the northeastern 

 part of Xorthfleld, tributary to this same terrace in Dakota county, and especially over the "Stan- 

 ton flat" in northwestern Goodhue county. It is probable, however, that some part of this gravel 

 reached the Cannon valley by way of the Prairie creek, at the time of the morainic accumulation 

 between Faribault and 'Jannon City. 



The Bridijcirah-r kunii'. The most important phenomenon of the drift 

 in Rice county is the kame in Bridgewater and Cannon City townships. It 

 can be traced, with unimportant interruptions, from the N. W. $ of the 



