ACTION OF WINB 285 



The tendency of the wind is not, however, in all eases toward 

 forming drifts and ridges, but at times rather to reduce the 

 land to one general level. J. Flinders Petrie^ states that near 

 the ancient cemetery of Tell Nebesheh, on the Isthmus of Suez, 

 the surface of the country has been cut down at the rate of 4 

 inches a century until some 8 feet have been removed from 

 the dry areas and deposited in the intervening depressions, 

 slowly converting the existing lakes into marshes, and the 

 mai^shes into dry land. An even more rapid change of eon- 

 tours is that described by Dwight^ as having taken place on 

 Cape Cod, Massachusetts. The entire country here is com- 

 posed of sand so susceptible to the drifting action of the wind 

 that it has for years been the custom of the people to sow pines 

 and coarse beach grass to hold it in place. In the instance 

 described by Dwight, however, reckless pasturage had so far 

 destroyed the grass as to lessen its protecting power, and 

 under the strong breezes from the open Atlantic it began to 

 drift rapidly. Over an area of about 1000 acres the sand was 

 blown away to a depth, in many places, of 10 feet. *' Nothing," 

 says Dwight, '^ could exceed the dreariness of this scene. JMot a 

 living creature was visible; not a house, nor even a green thing 

 except the whortleberries which tufted a few lonely hillocks 

 rising to the height of the original surface, and prevented by 

 this defence from being blown away also. The impression made 

 by this landscape cannot be realized without experience. It 

 was a compound of wildness, gloom, and solitude. I felt 

 myself transported to the borders of Nubia, and was well 

 prepared to meet the sand columns so forcibly described by 

 Bruce, and after him by Darwin. A troup of Bedouins would 

 have finished the picture, banished every thought of my own 

 country, and set us down in an African waste." 



One more instance of contour changes of this sort must suffice. 

 It is stated^ that in Pipestone and Rock counties in Minnesota, 

 the bluffs facing to the westward are, as a rule, more precipi- 

 tous and more rocky than those facing in the opposite direction. 

 This is regarded by Professor Winchell as due to the action of 

 the prevailing westerly winds, combined with the drying effects 

 of the southwestern sun in summer. The winds uncover and 



*Proc. Eoyal Geographic Soc, November, 1889, p. 64:$. 

 ' Travels in New England and New York, Vol. Ill, p. 101. 

 ^ Geol. of Minnesota, Yol. I, p. 570. 



