THE NINTH OE LEAF HILLS MORAINE. 165 



mostly flat bottom of stratified sand and gravel. Along its next 2 miles the 

 Hill River occupies its east side, and close west of this stream the central 

 part of the channel contains a kame or esker plateau of gravel and sand 

 which extends 2 miles from north to south, with a width of a quarter of a 

 mile or less, rising 40 to 50 feet above the bottom of the old watercourse, 

 a half mile wide, west of the plateau. Continuing south-southwestward 4 

 miles farther within the moraine, by the west end of a lake in section 24, 

 township 149, range 41, to the Poplar River, in the southwest quarter of 

 section 3, township 148, range 41, this channel is a marshy hollow, from 1 

 mile to only a third of a mile wide. Beyond the morainic belt, its next 2 

 miles, reaching south to Mcintosh, are now part of the valley of the Poplar 

 River; and its remaining 5 miles also extend nearly due south, uniting 

 with the Sand Hill River in section 10, township 147, range 41. 



The glacial stream flowing through this channel undoubtedly con- 

 tributed a large share of the delta, cliiefly composed of sand and fine silt, 

 which was accumulated where the Sand Hill River emptied into Lake 

 Agassiz, at a distance of about 20 miles to the west. Other portions of 

 this delta deposit, though probably far less in their aggregate amount, 

 were also brought by many small streams and rivulets which flowed down 

 from the melting ice-sheet along its edge lying near the Sand Hill River, 

 between this old watercourse and the place of disappearance of the moraine 

 in the lake. 



On the area of Lake Agassiz the course of the ice front forming its 

 northern border at the time of the Leaf Hills moraine probably extended 

 westward from the -vacinity of Maple Lake to Beltrami, the Goose Rapids 

 of the Red River, Buxton and Reynolds, and thence cm'ved northwest- 

 ward, passing near Arvilla, Larimore, and McCanna, to the moi'ainic islands 

 in the west edge of Lake Agassiz, forming the east side of the Elk and 

 Golden valleys. Abundant bowlders, many of them of large size, are 

 strewn upon the till which was the bed of the lake in the: part of this 

 course lying sovith of the Sand Hill River for 6 miles east of Beltrami. 

 Farther west, in crossing the central part of the Red River Valley, the 

 surface is till, containing plentiful small bowlders and gravel, and having 

 slight inequalities of contour, the small ridges and swells being 5 to 8 or 



