That water was the principal agent, we infer from the fact, that the soil is always alluvial to greater or less depth; the former we call prairie, the latter barren. But how could the country from the southern shore of Lake Erie to Chillicothe, a distance of more than one hundred and fifty miles from north to south, ever be covered with water long enough to form alluvial soil, in many places from four to six feet in depth? I answer, that the Niagara river, the present outlet of Lake Erie, has worn away several hundred feet, and in that way the lake is lowered in the same proportion. The high land, composed entirely of sand, originally extending from the Ohio northerly upwards of forty miles, to Chillicothe, has been worn through by the Scioto river; and the waters which once for ages covered the whole country north of the hills along the Ohio river have been drained off, and the dry land appears where once stood the waters of lakes Erie and Michigan, then forming but one great lake. I am fully impressed with the belief, that were the bottom of Niagara river as high as it once was, the upper lakes would now, as formerly, empty themselves into the Ohio by the Scioto and Miami rivers, and into the Mississippi by the Illinois. I might proceed to examine every part of the country where prairies and barrens are found; but they have all been formed by the same agent, and that is water. An objection to this opinion may be raised by some, that these prairies and barrens are frequently found in the counties of Delaware, Champaign, Madison, Fayette, &c. on ground considerably elevated. Are they higher than the hills near Chillicothe? From a careful inspection, but without any instruments, I am convinced that they are none of them as high.