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Effects on Shores

Wherever any rock is found in place on the immediate shore of this lake it is invariably limestone, which usually lies near the surface of the water and never forms high cliffs, like those of the Mississippi river. On the west shore the rock is covered from twenty to one hundred feet by a deposite of clay, and on the east or Michigan side it supports about the same depth of loose moving sand. The action of the waves upon the west shore is constantly wearing it away at the base causing large masses to fall into the water, where it is worn down and deposited in the bottom of the lake. Hence this bank is uniformly as near a perpendicular as the nature of the material will admit. It is impossible to climb it in most places, and itis often dangerous to approach too near the margin, as the Earth on which you stand may soon be precipitated an hundred feet into the water of the lake.

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