Page:The Journal of geology (IA journalofgeology21894univers).pdf/414

the high summits of Mendon, Killington and Shrewsbury extending east and west shut off the view in this direction. The lowest part of this amphitheatre is just northwest of Cuttingsville where Mill Creek has cut down to an elevation of 1000 feet above the sea. Killington Peak marks the highest point to the north, 4241 feet. The Central Vermont Railroad finds the lowest pass in the southern part of the range through this amphitheatre at Summit Station, 1500 feet above the sea.

Standing on the summit of Killington a wilderness of mountains meets one's view; the Taconic Mountains on the west and southwest; the Adirondacks to the northwest; far away northeast the White Mountains are plainly visible and the sharp outlying peaks, Monadnock, Kearsarge and Wachusett are seen to the southeast. The summits of all these mountains, with the multitude of peaks in Vermont, have the appearance of a remarkably uniform height about which numerous narrow valleys are seen; their relatively uniform height can safely be referred to an ancient base-level plain, in which upon elevation the north and south gently-flowing streams were quickly cut along the linear limestone belts, hastening and causing the development of the torrential lateral streams that flow east and west from the Green Mountain divide. It is to this torrential character of the streams and the schistose nature of the rocks that the sharp, angular topography in large part seems to be due. Rutland and Plymouth valleys, some twelve miles apart on either side of the range, are deeply cut in limestone—the former at Rutland to a depth of 500 feet above the sea. The great cutting power of the streams flowing into this valley from the east is thus seen to be due to a fall of over 3000 feet in a distance of six miles. The Green Mountain divide is about midway between these two valleys. Relatively less pronounced topographical features characterize the amphitheatre; sharp, high elevations occur, which are capped by more resistant rocks than those making up the main central area. It is between the lower rocks of this central depression and the formation along the east and west borders and to the north that an unconformity separating the rocks