'80 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



tween the two is low and composed wholly of drift. Indian carry, 

 between Upper Saranae lake and Stony creek pond belonging to 

 the Kacquette system, is less than a mile long, with a probable 

 drift-filled channel between the two. 



If the small brooks which cascade down the mountain sides into 

 the lakes are left out of account, the main streams all have greater 

 fall in their middle and lower reaches than in the upper portion 

 of their courses. As time passes, this will become less and less 

 true, and when the drainage becomes mature the reverse will be 

 the case. When this stage is reached, the opportunities for whole- 

 sale changes in the present arrangement of the streams are sure 

 to be improved. 



The four principal north-flowing rivers of the Adirondacks, the 

 Saranae, Ausable, Kacquette and St Kegis, rise in the heart of the 

 region and flow, the first two northeastward into Lake Cham- 

 plain, the others to the northwest into the St Lawrence, down the 

 slopes of the north-south axis of uplift. As they thus diverge, 

 other streams take their rise on the opposite sides of the divide 

 to the northward, but their sources are at lower altitudes, and 

 they are of less volume and are shorter than the first four. The 

 Oreat Chazy, flowing northeast, and the Chateaugay, 'Salmon and 

 Deer rivers to the northwest are the principal members of this 

 igroup. 



The Saranae is unique among these streams in that it crosses 

 the main axis of elevation. Two main gaps cross this divide 

 north of Mt Whiteface. The first is to the eastward of Franklin 

 ITalls, is due to the presence of the easily erodable rocks of the 

 crystalline limestone series, and is now drift-filled and not occu- 

 pied by any large stream, though seemingly the former channel 

 of one. The other gap, through which the Saranae now goes, is 

 at Unionfalls and has rock bottom in the river at 1400 feet, while 

 the altitude of the low divide on the drift surface in the valley 

 east of Franklin Falls is at 1700 feet. 



The Saranae rises in Lake Clear, or rather in the large marsh 

 •some two miles in diameter, which lies to the northeast of that 

 foody of water and is merely its former extension in that direction, 



