THE BLOOMINGTON MORALISTIC SYSTEM. 249 



section just discussed, but its inner-border belt, as noted above, loses its 

 strength in eastern Bureau County, and in the vicinity of the Illinois 

 River rises only a few feet above the inner-border plain. With the decline 

 of this belt a still later belt appears on the plain to the east, as noted 

 above. The two main belts are closely associated for about 20 miles in 

 southern Lee County, being separated only by a narrow plain 1 to 2 miles 

 in width, through the midst of which Bureau Creek has its passage. They 

 then diverge, the course of the inner one being slightly west of south, 

 through eastern Bureau County, while the outer continues with a course 

 slightly south of west along the borders of Lee and Bureau counties for a 

 distance of 20 miles. It there turns southward through central Bureau 

 County, curving around the western border of the Bureau Creek Basin 

 and passing just west of Wyanet and Tiskilwa. The plain between the 

 moraines in Bureau County has a gently undulating surface and stands 

 nearly as high as the inner moraine, but is much lower than the outer one. 

 There is, in this plain, a slight tendency to ridging, with NE.-SW. trend, 

 which to some extent governs the course of streams. 



The outer belt throughout its course in southern Lee and northern and 

 central Bureau counties maintains a width of 4 to 6 miles. This includes 

 gradual slopes which culminate in a well-defined narrow-crested ridge that 

 is developed along a considerable portion of the section under discussion. 

 The crested ridge usually occupies a breadth of less than a mile, and stands 

 30 to 50 feet above the less sharply ridged portions on its borders. In 

 places the sharp crest is absent and the gradual slopes occupy its entire 

 breadth. Near Wyanet a narrow depression as low as the outer-border 

 plain interrupts this ridge and furnishes a passage for the Hennepin Canal, 

 now under construction. This depression is not an open valley, but has 

 morainic knolls on its bottom and slopes. 



In southern Lee County the knolls and undulations on the slopes 

 of the moraine are much less conspicuous than in Bureau County, their 

 height usually being but 10 or 20 feet, while in Bureau County they 

 frequently attain a height of 30 or 40 feet. Basins are common only in 

 central Bureau County, though they are found occasionally in other parts 

 of the moraines. The deepest are only 10 or 15 feet below the bordering ■ 

 rims, and their area is seldom more than an acre or so each. On the outer 

 face of the moraine in Lee County, from the vicinity of the Third Principal 



