surface of the country. While these streams are deepening their channels in the Cretaceous cover, which is unshaded with marginal contour lines in the figures, their subsequent, autogenetic branches are irregularly disposed, because there is no lateral variation of structure to guide them; but after a time, the baselevelled surface of the buried Triassic beds is reached, as is shown by linear shading in the valley bottoms of figs. 4, 5, 6, 7. The growth of the subsequent branches then developed, will be along the strike of the Triassic softer beds, that is, about square
Fig. 3
to the course of the three transverse streams under consideration. The most rapid growth will be found on the branches of the largest stream, A, because it will most quickly cut down its channel close to the baselevel of the time and thus provide steep sloping valley-sides, from which the subsequent branches cut backwards most energetically. In due time the main streams discover the particularly resistant transverse lava sheets in the underlying formation; and then the subsequent branches of the largest transverse stream on the up-stream side of the obstructions, for example, F and G, fig. 4, will have a great advantage over those of the smaller streams. The most rapidly growing subsequent branch, G, fig. 5, of the largest transverse master stream, A, may grow headwards so fast as to push away the divide, X, which separates it from the head of the opposing subsequent branch, J, of the next adjacent smaller transverse stream, C, and thus finally to capture and divert the headwaters, H, of the smaller transverse stream to the larger one, as in fig. 6.
