THE STORM ON THE LAKE.
The philosophy of mountains, springs, brooks, and lakes.
Mountains make storms, storms make rain fall, and the rain that falls makes springs, brooks, and lakes; thus mountains, storms, brooks, and lakes go together.
Mountains make storms, and cause the rain to fall by chilling the air around their summits, and condensing the vapor into rain and into snow. Around the lower parts of the mountains, where it is pretty warm, the vapor falls in rain. Around the higher parts, where it is cold, it falls in snow.
Formation of rivers.
Part of the water from the rain soaks into the ground, on the declivities of the mountains, and comes out again, lower down, in springs. Another portion flows down the ravines in brooks and torrents, and these, uniting together, form larger and larger streams, until, at length, they become great rivers, that flow across wide continents. If you were to follow up almost any river in the world, you would come to mountains at last.
It does not always rain among the mountains, but the springs and streams always flow. The reason of this is, that before the water which falls in one storm or shower has had time to drain out from the ground and flow away, another storm comes and renews the supply. If it were to cease to rain altogether among the mountains, the water that is now in them would soon be all drained off, and the springs and streams would all be dry.
But how is it in regard to lakes? How are the lakes formed?
How lakes are formed.