Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t7fkt Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-24T00:35:59.820Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

II.—On Watersheds

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 May 2009

Extract

In connection with the discussion on the origin of hills and valleys, which has recently occupied the pages of the Geological Magazine, I would submit a few observations on some phenomena, in evidence of the great power of subaërial denudation, which seem scarcely to have been noticed with the prominence they deserve. I assume that the joint action of sea and river denudation is un-questioned, and that the main point under discussion is relative to which of these processes determined the final contour of the land. What I wish particularly to notice is that the forma of the whole land surface with some trifling exceptions (as lake basins, which appear to admit of special explanation) is merely a modification of the same principle of contour as the true river valley, exhibiting a system of watersheds by which almost everypart of the land is connected with the sea by adjacent land on a graduated series of levels lower than itself.

Type
Original Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1866

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 Copied from the map appended to the Report of the Jamaica Commission.