454 GEOLOGY OF CENTRAL WISCONSIN. 



cupy the drift depressions. The streams of this region are numerous, 

 large, rapid, and extraordinarily clear, but without rock rapids. Eock 

 bluffs are not frequent, and those that occur are without the castel- 

 lated appearance so characteristic of the more western outliers. The 

 whole of the area descends from its highest parts in northwestern 

 Waushara, where the altitude is about 540 feet, in a southeasterly 

 direction towards the Fox river, whose altitude at Portage is 200 

 feet, and at Berlin 175 feet. The soil of this district is for the most 

 part sandy. In central Waushara, however, good land occurs on 

 limestone and crystalline rook drift, whilst in eastern Waushara the 

 stratified drift clays yield an excellent soil. West of the high 

 ground along the line of Adams and Waushara counties, we 

 come upon an altogether different region, (2) the next of our sub- 

 ordinate divisions. This is the central sand plain of Adams and 

 Juneau counties, which is traversed from north to south by the Wis- 

 consin river. Here we find no drift at all, a generally flat surface, 

 rising gradually from the river in each direction, and dotted by nu- 

 merous lofty and jagged peaks of sandstone, large and clear streams, 

 and a prevailing growth of small oaks, interrupted by a few prairies 

 and marshes, and mingling with small pine towards the north. 

 Crossing now the divide on the northwest corner of Juneau county, 

 we find ourselves in the sandstone portion of the Black river valley, (3) 

 which resembles, for short distances from the river, in its general 

 sandy, plain-like character, and gigantic, castellated outliers, the re- 

 gion last described. As we pass westward, however, from Black 

 river, or southward along its course, we find ourselves in a region of 

 narrow but deeply eroded valleys and of steep hills. Returning now 

 to the central plain of Juneau county, and proceeding towards its south- 

 west corner, we cross, in the towns of Summit, Wonewoc, Plymouth and 

 Lindina, a high, narrow, and deeply indented watershed, and find our- 

 selves in the upper part of the Baraboo river valley, (4) which we may 

 regard as another of the subordinate districts of the central sandstone 

 region. The upper part of this valley shows the usual characters of 

 the valleys of the drif tless part of the state, being narrow, with abrupt 

 sides, which are often of precipitous sandstone. The tributary 

 streams have similar, but narrower and steeper valleys. On either 

 side the country rises rapidly, and shows frequently excellent land. 

 As the river is followed into Sauk county, its valley widens, but the 

 same deeply indented divides are observed; that on the south, in the 

 towns of Wcstfield and Reedsburg, rising into the horizon of the 

 Lower Magnesian limestone, so that large patches of good limestone 

 country occur here. In central Sauk county the Baraboo traverses 



