4 8 



EDWARD M. SHEPARD 



is made up of a series of more or less parallel ridges, swamps, and 

 shallow lakes. Where the Mississippi River cuts through it the 

 banks exhibit large deposits of sand and alluvium underlaid by a 

 thick bed of tenaceous blue clay — the Port Hudson clay. Not only 

 is an unconformity exhibited between the alluvium and clay deposit, 

 but from New Madrid nearly to Osceola the bed of clay has an 

 irregular, wave-like outline, and in places is abruptly faulted. Stumps 



Fig. i. — View on swamp bordering Varney River, near Kennett, Mo. (Photo- 

 graphed by M. L. Fuller.) 



are frequently seen imbedded in it, occasionally in a series, one above 

 the other, extending from below low- water mark to a height 25 feet 

 above that mark. 



McGee calls attention, in his paper, to the dry bayous that 

 squarely and obliquely enter Reelfoot Lake — a sunken lake in 

 Tennessee, saying that "when this occurs there is no sign of delta- 

 building, and both channels and natural levees may be traced long 

 distances in the lake." He also says: "This absence of deltas 

 indicates that the uplift or deformation occurred suddenly." 



