

Niagara Falls 



1907 mild winter, for even on January 25, 1906, the farmers were 

 Spencer ploughing. After having the report well advanced, its complex 



character demanded a revision in the field, to which I returned 

 for several weeks, leaving it on October 26, 1906. 



The new investigations under the survey were by: — 

 ( 1 ) Soundings at all the changing points of the gorge, even 

 under Niagara Falls themselves, and in the Whirlpool; (2) Bor- 

 ings to ascertain the character of the buried channel beds, over 

 which the river afterwards flowed; (3) instrumental surveys of 

 the old river banks and the position of the strata; (4) Investi- 

 gations of lake fluctuations, based upon the daily records for 

 fifty years, as to their bearing upon the stability of the earth's 

 crust, the lowering of the lake outlets and of the lakes them- 

 selves, and as to new results of the discharges of the rivers — 

 all of these modified by (5) Meteorological changes. The future 

 effects on Niagara Falls and upper lakes by the diversion of the 

 water of the Falls have been ascertained. The recession of the 

 Falls, from their birth to the present day and for the future, has 

 been determined, as well as their age. The existence of an 

 ancient Erie outlet some miles to the west, not hitherto suspected, 

 is a most important discovery in the history of the changes in the 

 lake region. The International Boundary Line, showing the 

 greater Falls to be in Canada, has been laid down on the map. 



Besides the other scientific results, features bearing on inter- 

 national questions have arisen in connection with the effects of 

 the drainage of the Falls at the International Boundary, and the 

 lowering of the lakes by power diversions, as also the ownership 

 of the water rights of Niagara Falls. Even the establishment 

 of the Boundary Line at the falls comes to be a geological ques- 

 tion, and not merely one of ordinary surveying. — Preface. 



Spencer, Joseph William Winthrop. Recession of the Niagara 

 Falls. (Brit. Assn. for A. S. Report 77th meeting. 1908. Pp. 572- 

 573.) [Abstract. 1 



The paper from which this abstract is taken was read before the society 

 in August, 1907, and gives the results of researches and observations of 



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