234 PROCEEDINGS: BOSTON SOCIETY NATURAL HISTORY. 
b) perhaps the most magnificent cataract of the series. Next comes 
Oceana Falls, a sort of double cataract having a fall of 41 feet. The 
Bridal Veil, a fall of 17 feet, is the last, its water flowing in a broad 
sheet down the sloping surface of the smooth rock floor. 
This series of falls is famous throughout the South for its beauty, 
and has made the locality a well known summer resort. Trails have 
been built along the steep walls wherever possible, so that one may 
get down into the gorge near the falls without much trouble. The 
views up and down the gorge from the cliffs on either side are as wild 
and picturesque as one could desire. 
Above the falls, the Tallulah River flows through a fairly young 
gorge between spurs of the Tallulah and other mountain groups. It 
is true that the features are not as youthful as in the Grand Chasm, 
and narrow strips of floodplain are found, now on one side of the 
river, now on the other. But the water is fairly swift, rapids occur, 
and the valley walls are steep-sided. The stream here has its path 
through the mountains, however, and not on the Chattahoochee level. 
Surely nothing could be more striking than the contrast between 
these streams of the Tugaloo drainage with their deep gorges, swift 
waters, numerous falls and rapids, and boulder strewn channels and 
the streams of the Chattahoochee drainage flowing through shallow 
upland valleys with sandy floodplains and quiet waters. 
(8) Hanging valleys of minor tributary streams There are cer¬ 
tain streams in the Tallulah district which are tributary to the Tugaloo 
system, but which do not occupy deep gorges after the manner usually 
characteristic of the streams belonging to that system. These are 
very small streams or brooks, and flow through open upland valleys 
almost to the edge of the gorge occupied by the main stream into 
which they empty, when they plunge down by a series of cascades to 
the lower level. This drop of some hundreds of feet is not by a sheer 
fall on the very face of the gorge wall, but rather by a succession of 
leaps, some of which may be 50 or 75 feet vertically, and it generally 
takes place in a little notch cut slightly back into the wall of the main 
gorge. Nevertheless, this notch is so slightly developed in some cases, 
that it does not seem amiss to speak of the valleys as hanging valleys. 
One may drive for several miles along one of these streams, as the 
wagon road and stream channel are near the same level, but when the 
main gorge is approached he is surprised to find that without warning 
the stream has suddenly parted company with him; and he hears it 
