8o Conservation Reader 



deep hollows of bare earth. The water falling upon these 

 mountains runs off in torrents, carrying even large boulders 

 as it does in our Western deserts. Here and there the 

 natives have built terraces of rock to aid in holding the 

 soil, but many parts of the country are almost wholly de- 

 serted. The waters run off the mountains so quickly that 

 they often form vast floods which spread over the lower 

 valleys and plains. The floods destroy the crops and 

 drown the people. 



Eastward of China there is an arm of the Pacific Ocean 

 known as the Yellow Sea. Why do you suppose this name 

 was given to the sea? One of the great rivers of China, 

 the Yangste-kiang, empties into it. The river rises in the 

 barren mountains of which we have just been speaking, 

 and it is continually bringing so much mud and sand that 

 a whole sea is being filled. Long before a ship comes within 

 sight of the land the waters are seen to be of a muddy, yel- 

 low color. 



In the smaller valleys of Korea the natives build dikes 

 along the rivers to keep the mountain floods from spreading 

 sand and gravel over their rice fields. Every year they have 

 to make the dikes higher as the river beds fill up. 



Thus we see that all over the world people are suffering 

 because they have not obeyed the laws which Nature has 

 made for the protection of the soil. 



