230 



shoreward thrust. The process is repeated from time to time during the winter, 

 but ceases with the melting of the ice in the spring." 



The formation of these cracks is accompanied with noise, and, when the ice 

 has reached the thickness of four or five inches, the noise resembles the distant 

 booming of cannon. These cracks may be mere seams in the ice, or they may be 

 several inches wide. On December 7, I measured a crack three-eighths of an inch 

 wide in ice one and three-fourths inches thick. On December 9, Mr. Dolan meas- 

 ured one two and three-fourths inches wide in ice four inches thick. On the same 

 day he counted eleven loud reports caused by the formation of ice cracks in five 

 minutes. They form during all parts of the day and night. They cross the lake 

 in every direction, and, while the cracks are slightly zig-zag, their general courses 

 are in straight lines. 



The ice is very clear and pure, especially out from the shore, where there is 

 no vegetation near the surface. Is is used very largely for commercial purposes, 

 the ice being cut from about one-fourth of the surface of Syracuse Lake each 

 year. 



The only stream flowing into the lake and containing water throughout the 

 year is Upper Turkey Creek, which enters the lake on the east side of Jarrett's 

 Bay. During the summer months it was filled with an abundant growth of water 

 vegetation, and was without any perceptible current. When the water is high 

 the chain of small lakes lying to the southeast is drained into the large lake 

 through Jarrett's Creek, entering Jarrett's Bay a half mile south of Turkey 

 Creek. During the past summer no water entered the lake from this source. A 

 small stream one-fourth of a mile west of Vawter Park, and another from the 

 east side of Johnson's Bay, contribute water to the lake when the water is high, 

 but not during the dry summer monlhs. There are no springs around Syracuse 

 Lake, but springs are found along the margin of the main lake wherever the 

 shore rises fifteen feet or more and extends across the country as elevated territory. 

 These springs usually enter the lake near high water mark. This gives springs 

 along Crow's Bay, Mineral Point, the south and west sides of Jarrett's Bay, and 

 along the south shore from Vawter Park one mile west. No springs are found 

 along the bluffs at Jones', Wawasee, Cedar Point, Morrison's Island, or Conkling 

 Hill, but in each case these highlands are narrow and surrounded by marsh or 

 lowland. For a half mile along Crow's Bay the bluff is more than twenty feet 

 high. All along the foo of the bluff 1 the water percolates from the gravel, and 

 at places it flows from quite strong springs. At Mineral Point there are a number 



