WABASH DRAINAGE SYSTEM. 191 



The headwater portion of this stream, Hke that of the Mississinawa 

 and Salamouie, has a poorly developed channel and a sluggish current. It 

 is only in the lower 25 or 30 miles that erosion of any consequence has 

 occurred. Even here the valley scarcely exceeds 50 feet in depth. 



TIPPECANOE RIVER. 



Tippecanoe River is the main northern tributary of the Wabash within 

 the State of Indiana. It has a length of about 125 miles, and drains a belt 

 averaging perhaps 20 miles in width. Its source is in the midst of the 

 great interlobate moraine of northeastern Indiana, at an elevation of nearly 

 1,000 feet above tide. It descends the northwest face of the moraine from 

 southwestern Noble County into Kosciusko County, reaching a level 800 

 feet above tide north of Warsaw. It follows the north border of the 

 moraine a few miles southwestward, to the point where the Saginaw and 

 Erie moraines become differentiated. It then passes through a gap in the 

 Saginaw moraine and enters a sandy plain formerly occupied by the waters 

 of "old Lake Kankakee." After traversing this plain for about 60 miles, 

 it leaves the old lake area near Monti cello and passes through an Erie 

 moraine which follows the northwest border of the Wabash River, and 

 enters the Wabash from a narrow plain on the inner slope of this moraine. 

 Although bordered in places by elevated knolls and ridges in the 

 upper portion of its course, it has no well-defined valley, nor has it exca- 

 vated a valley of much depth in the old lake bottom. The main excavation 

 'occurs in the lower 30 miles of its course, and even here its channel is nar- 

 row and scarcely reaches 100 feet in depth. In this lower portion the rate 

 of fall is about 3 feet per mile. The fall is less in the section traversing 

 the old lake bottom, being about 150 feet between Rochester and Monti- 

 cello, a distance of 60 miles. The great fall of the upper portion is chiefly 

 made in short sections, connecting marshes whose levels become successively 

 lower in passing down the slope of the moraine. 



WEST WHITE RIVER. 



The chief tributary of the Wabash is West White River, which enters 

 it from the east at a point about 90 miles from the mouth. If we include 

 with the West White its entire system of drainage, it will embrace about 

 one-third of the State of Indiana, or an area about as great as that drained 

 by the Wabash and its other tributaries within that State. The West 



