274 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXXIX. No. 999 



Kan., also in the bench along the north 

 side of Kansas City, Missouri. At Leaven- 

 worth, St. Joseph, and south part of Sioux 

 City, besides several less conspicuous points 

 between, and further down the river. Simi- 

 lar deposits are found in the lower part of 

 the Kansas River near Edwardsville, Holli- 

 day and Bonner Springs. Here it is due 

 to back water from the Missouri, and the 

 character and color differ from those of the 

 Missouri River deposit. 



After considerable examination I have 

 no doubt that the similar terraces in west- 

 ern Iowa along the streams which headed 

 near the edge of the Wisconsin ice are to be 

 referred to the same cause. I refer to the 

 terraces on the Boyer, Soldier and Maple. 

 The absence of such along Mosquito, 

 Nishnabotna and Nodaway confirms this 

 conclusion. They were too far away to 

 share in the floods from the Wisconsin ice. 



Similar floods may have attended similar 

 recessions from later moraines, but they 

 were less effective, and after the third or 

 fourth the ice retired too far away to affect 

 the Missouri notably. Numerous lower ter- 

 races are found along the Missouri and its 

 tributaries, which record such stages which 

 attended the gradual deepening of their 

 channels in the 15,000 or 60,000 years since. 



In the recession of the ice, glacial lakes 

 were formed from time to time. Lake Da- 

 kota was formed in the central part of the 

 James River valley, while the fourth mo- 

 raine was forming. It became nearly filled 

 with a fine silt closely resembling loess.'' 

 Later hake Agassiz occupied the Red River 

 valley, but it was beyond the scope of our 

 subject. 



I leave the subject with you. If I have 

 made any point clearer or suggested a 

 thought which may lead to further light I 

 shall be well satisfied. 



It may gratify our national pride a little 



7 Iowa Acad. Sci., Vol. XIII., p. 187. 



to see how cleverly nature, not long ago, 

 changed so much of the drainage which was 

 sweeping the rich soil of our great plains 

 into the British dominions, so that it was 

 permanently diverted into our borders. 



Prom this sketch, we see how nature has 

 wrought the course and character of the 

 greatest stream on earth, and one of the 

 most important. It may not be called as 

 historic as others, for its history is yet to 

 come. Who can doubt that it is destined to 

 be associated with some of the mightiest 

 and most far-reaching events of the future, 

 J. E. Todd 



Univeesity op Kansas 



BENJAMIN OSGOOD PEIBCE 

 The death of Professor Benjamin Osgood 

 Peirce at Cambridge on January 14 removes 

 before his time one of the most valued mem- 

 bers of the Harvard faculty and one of the 

 most scholarly of American physicists. 

 Having been asked by the editor of Science 

 to contribute an obituary note, although feel- 

 ing that one of his colleagues could do it in 

 a more accurate manner, I could not forego 

 the melancholy satisfaction of paying a per- 

 sonal tribute to the best of teachers and the 

 cherished friend of thirty years. Peirce came 

 to Harvard as instructor in the same year as 

 the writer as a freshman, and the admiration 

 he then inspired has only grown with years. 



Peirce's first ancestor in America was 

 Richard Norman, who came to Gloucester in 

 1623. His great-grandfather, Benjamin 

 Peirce, was killed at Lexington. Prom him 

 was also descended Benjamin Peirce, the 

 distinguished mathematician. On his mother's 

 side Peirce was descended from ship-owners in 

 Salem. Born on February 11, 1854, at 

 Beverly, it was from such sterling stock that 

 Peirce inherited the New England conscience 

 and capacity for thoroughness which were his 

 leading characteristics. He received an excel- 

 lent preliminary education in the schools of 

 Beverly, and afterwards prepared himself for 

 college, with plenty of Latin, Greek and mathe- 



