60 Micellaneous Geological Topics 



The current of this river is very rapid, and the sand bars are (like 

 the billow^s of the ocean) forever rolling in the current, and shifting 

 from place to place, and when v^^ith the progress of the current they 

 leave the river, others will follow close behind. This river drains a 

 country whose extent is more than three times greater than that 

 watered by any other river of the United States, including the 

 Mississippi, above its junction with the Missouri. It is not as large as 

 the Ohio or Tennessee rivers, and its freshets make very little im-. 

 pression on the Mississippi, as far down as the Natchez basin. It is 

 the Ohio, that compels the Mississippi to call to her assistance, her 

 thousand reservoirs, and her extensive vale, to retain the waters un- 

 bosomed by this most beautiful river, her magnificent tributary. 



When the prairies of that immense region lying on both sides of 

 the Missouri, and extending quite to the Rocky Mountains, shall 

 have vanished, what will be the appearance, and size of this river ? 

 The same question will apply to the Arkansas and Red River ? 

 It should be remarked, that the country bordering on these rivers, 

 is more level, than that on the Ohio. Hence their waters will not 

 be extricated so readily ; but nevertheless their bounds must be ex- 

 tended to an incredible degree. When all the water that falls on 

 this great Country, and which now serves to replenish those mighty 

 rivers, that roll through dark and gloomy forests, and through inter- 

 minable deserts, shall be turned in their courses, and caused to keep 

 as much above ground as the waters of the Ohio ; the Missouri 

 will then indeed become vast, and her freshets will be truly terrific. 

 Judging from the observations of more than twenty five years, we 

 will venture to say, that the Missouri must, by and by, discharge 

 in a given period, twenty times as much water as now. 



OPINIONS OF MR. DUNBAR. 



In the 6th vol. of the American Philosophical Transactions of 

 Philad. may be seen " A description of the Mississippi and its delta," 

 by Mr. Dunbar, in which, when speaking of the formation of the 

 delta, he remarks. "When we survey this immense work, formed 

 by the hand of nature, we cannot accord with the opinions of cer- 

 tain visionary philosophers, who have been pleased to amuse them- 

 selves with the pretended infantile state of our continent, compared 

 to their trans-atlantic world ; but on the contrary, we must grant to 

 it an incalculable antiquity." If Mr. Dunbar had been apprised of 

 the existence and extent of the Natchez basin, that he sat and 



