OCR Text |
Show In the northern part of Minnesota there is a great area of land so flat that its waters sometimes flow into Hudson Bay and sometimes into the Gulf of Mexico. This area contains the headwaters of the Mississippi. There are times when certain lakes discharge at both ends, the northern outlet taking the flow through Red River or Rainy River into Lake Winnipeg, and thence into Hudson Bay; while the southern outlet leads to the Mississippi. Therefore There-fore the dividing line between the Mississippi Miss-issippi drainage basin and that of Hudson Hud-son Bay is indefinite and in many places cannot be determined, and the consideration consid-eration of these two basins in connection connec-tion with their water supplies and the uses that can be made thereof must logically be taken up together. The Geological Survey discusses the Hudson Bay and Mississippi River bisins in its recent publication, officially known as Water-Supply Paper 285. This work contains the results of riverflow measurements made during the year 1910. In view of the fact that the division of the waters along the Canadian boundary is becoming a more important international question, making mak-ing necessary by recent legiglation the organization of the joint International Commission, under whose jurisdiction these matters were placed, this volume I is of unusual importance. The west- ernmost river covered by the report is St. Mary River, which rises in Montana, crosses the Canadian boundary, and empties in.o the Saskatchewan. The others are rivers largely those of North Dakota, Minnesota, and Wisconsin, although al-though considerable information is con tained concerning the rivers of Illinois and Iowa, which empty into the Mississippi. Miss-issippi. The information concerning the flow of river in Minnesota is unusually un-usually complete by reason of the fact that the State, through its Drainage Co.nmission, has cooperated with the I Geological Survey in the maintenance of the stream-flow stations. |