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The Ukrainian Mountain Country

Glancing at the map of the Ukraine, we perceive at once that in this country we should seek in vain for such a variety of surface configuration as is peculiar to Central or Western Europe. In Germany or France there appear in a comparatively small space the most varied landscape — chains of high mountains, central chains of mountains, terrace and hill country, plateaus and plains.

It is different here in our wide Ukraine. One can travel hundreds of miles in any direction without seeing a change in the character of the scenery. The uniformity which is typical for Eastern Europe is peculiar also to the Ukraine. But not to the extent that it is to Great Russia, where the endlessness of the flat country wearies the eye of the traveler. For there are in the Ukraine landscapes of high and central chains of mountains, picturesque hill districts and richly cut plateaus, marshy plains and steppes strewn with barrows. There is, then, in the Ukraine, a variety of surface configuration, but on a large scale, not as in Western or Central Europe, confined in a small space.

The morphological nucleus of the Ukraine is the closed group of pleateaus, which extends from the country at the foot of the Carpathians and the Polish part of the Vistula region to the Sea of Azof. Pontian Plateau or Avratinian Ridge are the commonly used but incorrect names of this plateau group. The first designation might do, but the second transfers the name of a little destitute hamlet at the source of the Sbruch to a territory of hundreds of thousands of square miles. We shall, therefore, select for this plateau group the name Ukrainian Plateau Group.

It forms a compact whole between the Carpathians and the Dnieper and is divided into the following individual sections: The Rostoch, between the San and Buh Rivers; Volin, between the Boh and the Teterev; Podolia, between the Dniester and the Boh; the Pocutian — Bessarabian Plateau, between the Dniester and the Prut; the Dnieper Plateau, between the Boh and the Dnieper. The plateau character continues at the rapids section of this river on the left bank, where, at some distance, the last member of the Ukrainian Plateau Group lies — the Donets Plateau.

The plateau group of the Ukraine is bordered on the north and south by two plain districts. The northern district consists of adjoining lowlands — Pidlassye, Polissye, and the Dnieper plain — and their extensions along the Donets; the southern district is made up of the long stretch of the Pontian steppe-plain, which, in the country at the foot of the Caucasus, merges into the Caspian desert-steppe.

Beyond the northern plain district, Ukrainian territory does not extend, except in the Don region, where it embraces the southern spurs of the Central Russian Plateau.

Besides these plateau and plain regions the Ukraine takes in also parts of three mountain systems of the European continent. The Ukraine is the only country of Eastern Europe which extends over into the region of the European mountains of plication. Parts of the Carpathians, the little Yaila chain of Crimea, and the western parts of the Caucasus lie, together with their environs, in Ukrainian territory.

From this general survey of the surface configuration of the Ukraine, we can easily see that more than nine tenths of the surface of this land is taken up by plains and plateaus. Nine-tenths of the Ukrainians have certainly never seen a mountain and do not even know what one looks like. Expressive of this circumstance is the fact that in the wide plateau and plain region of the Ukraine the most insignificant hills bear the high-sounding name of "mountain." But, despite this, the Ukraine also has its share in the three mountain systems of Europe — the Carpathians, the Yaila, and the Caucasus. All three were formed thru plication of the rock-layers.

The vast plication-formed mountain range of the Caucasus, even in the small part belonging to Ukrainian territory, attains an alpine height; the scenery of the Yaila along the Crimean Riviera is wonderful, but the Carpathians, although not as lofty as the Caucasus and not of such scenic beauty as the Yaila, are the dearest to the heart of the Ukrainian. For the Ukrainian nation expanded in the Caucasus only a century ago and has but just reached the Yaila. And the Eastern Carpathians have for more than a thousand years been a Ukrainian mountain range.

Still, hardly one-third of the 1300 km. curve of the Carpathians belongs to Ukrainian national territory. Toward the west the Carpathians are inhabited by Poles and Slovaks; in the east and south by the Romanians.

The boundary-posts of the Ukrainian territory extend in the west beyond the famous defile of Poprad. From the rounded peaks of the mountain country where the last Ukrainian villages lie, one sees rising at a very short distance the imposing range of the Tatra; still nearer lie the cliffs of the Pienini, famous geologically as well as for their scenery. In the eastern part of the Carpathian chain, Ukrainian territory reaches the Prislop pass, which connects the valleys of the Golden Bistritz and the Visheva (Visso). To the Ukraine, then, belongs the sandstone district of the Carpathians at that point where it is highest and most developed. It is called simply the "wooded Carpathians."

The western part of the sandstone Carpathians which lies within Ukrainian territory is called the Low Beskid. It is also known as Lemkivski Beskid because it is inhabited by the Ukrainian mountain tribe of the Lemkes. The Low Beskyd extends from the defile of Poprad to the valleys of the Strviazh River, the Oslava (Lupkiv pass), and the Laboretz. It is a broad -backed but not a' high mountain country. In long chains, gently undulating mountain ridges stretch from west to east and southeast. Their slopes are gentle; one can easily walk or even ride up, and numerous wagon-roads and highways lead straight over the crest or even along the edge of the crest. The peaks are rounded and of uniform height, except where an occasional gently vaulted mountain top rises above the low-hill country. Between gently sloping ranges there extend, in a longitudinal direction, valleys with watersheds and communicating passes. Broad, well-developed defiles separate the range into different sections. The Galician-Hungarian dividing-ridge has only slight gorges of genuine mountain passes.

The peaks and high passes of the Lower Beskid are insignificant. Only in the extreme west, on the Poprad and the Torissa, do the peaks reach a height of 1000 and 1 100 m.; further toward the east hardly 700 to 800 m. The important Dukla Pass is hardly 500 m. above sea-level. In the middle of the Beskid mountain country we even see a great longish strip of lower country ("the Sianok Lowlands") whose low hills are less than 300 m. high.

There is a connection between the insignificant height and soft landscape forms of the Low Beskid and the geological construction and evolution of the mountain range. This mountain country, like the whole sandstone-region of the Carpathians, is built up of strongly plicate and compressed Flysch — a series of sandstones slates, conglomerates, clays, etc., of the Cretacean and tertiary ages. All these species of rock occur in this region in thin layers and have little power of resistance; everywhere the basic mountain ridge is covered with a thick coat of weathering loam; rock piles are found very seldom. There is added the fact that all the sandstone Carpathians of the Ukrainian territory have been evened out by the destructive action of water and air into a more or less perfect plain. Not until the quaternary was the "obliterated" range raised anew and transformed into a mountain district by the action of the rivers which were cutting in again.

The Low Beskid was once covered with great, mixed forests. Now the once splendid virgin forests are completely thinned and all the ill effects of forest destruction have visited the poor mountain country. The fertile soil was washed away on the mountain-sides and heaped up with rubble and mud in the valley bottoms. The tribe of the Lemkos is therefore, perhaps, the poorest of all the Ukrainians and is compelled to seek an existence in distant lands.

In the southern part of the Low Beskid the boundaries of the Ukrainian nation in Hungary reach the northern part of the Hegyalia-Sovari Ridge, which, at this point, is 1100 m. high, and is composed of extinct trachyte volcanoes.

To the east of the Lupkiv Pass begins the second section of the Ukrainian Carpathians — the High Beskid. It stretches to the southeast as far as the valleys of the Stri, Opir and Latoritza Rivers (Pass of Verezki).

The High Beskid like the Low is composed of a number of parallel, weakly joined mountain ranges, which run northwest and southeast. The type of the Rost Mountains is, therefore, even more clearly marked in this part of the sandstone Carpathians than in the preceding. The mountain crests are gently sloped, the edge of the crests slightly curled, the height of the peaks constant, the passes only walled passes. Toward the southeast, though, the ridge steadily increases in height. The highest peaks are Halich (1335 m.), the beautifully pyramid-shaped rocky Piku (1405 m.) and the massive Polonina ruvna (1480 m.). In the Flysch of the High Beskid, two species of sandstone attain greater power of forming layers and of resisting pressure — the chiefly upper Cretacean Yamna sandstone and the Oligocene Magura sandstone. The former forms beautiful groups of rocks on peaks and precipices. The cliffs of Noich, with its traces of a rock castle, are the most famous.

The longitudinal valleys are much less developed in the High Beskid than in the Low. They are traversed only by smaller brooks. All larger streams like the Strviazh, Dniester and Opir, flow thru well-formed passes. Expansions of valleys (in regions of soft slate) alternate with contractions of valleys (in regions of hard sandstone). Most remarkable are the deeply cut out winding valleys (San, Striy), which offer the best proof of the former smoothing down and the later raising of the mountains.

Beautiful beech and evergreen forests still cover large parts of the High Beskid. Above the tree-line(1200— 1300m) we meet for the first time with the characteristic plant formation of the Polonini (mountain pastures) which yield excellent pasturage for large and small cattle during the summer and create the foundation for a primitive dairy industry.

Along the southern foot of the High Beskid, and separated from it by a chain of longitudinal valleys, a long chain of mountains rises above the neighboring Hungarian plain, bearing the name of Vihorlat (the Burnt Out). The Rivers Uz (Ungh), Latorizia and Bershava, have cut the Vihorlat into four sections. The range is lower than the Beskyd, since it is less than 1100 m. high, but it is strongly cut up by deep-gorged valleys, and has steep, rocky precipices, bold rocky summits and pretty little mountain lakes. The range, which is covered with thick oak forests, owes its scenic character to its geological composition. The Vyhorlat is a line of extinct volcanoes, in the old craters of which the mountain lakes of the region lie. The firm trachyte lava forms picturesque rock walls and peaks. East of the Verezki Pass begins a new mountain section, perhaps the most characteristic one in the sandstone Carpathians. It extends toward the east as far as the passes of the Prut and the Black Tyssa (Theiss) and the Yablonitza Pass. This part of the sandstone Carpathians bears the name of Gorgani.

The uniform mountain walls of the Beskid give way here to shorter mountain ridges, strongly cut up by cross valleys. The main streams of the northern slope, Opir, Limnitza — the two Bistritzas — flow thru deep, picturesque passes; still deeper are the valleys of the mountain streams which flow into the Theiss, as the Torez, Talabor, etc. It is a remarkable circumstance that the dividing border ridge is lower than the ridges facing it on the north and south, which are broken thru by magnificent passes.

The edge of the Gorgani ridge also shows traces of the old leveling-surface and has only small gorges, yet it is much more curled than in the Beskid. The ridge often becomes a sharp edge and the cone-shaped peaks further break its monotony. The height of the peaks is much greater than in the Beskyd. On the Galician side the Popadia attains a height of 1740 m.; Doboshanka, 1760 m.; Visoka, 1810 m.; Sivula, 1820 m.; in Hungarian territory the Stoh in the picturesque Bershavi group is 1680 m.; the Blisnitza, in the Svidovez Range, 1890 m., etc.

The ridges and peaks of the Gorgani are covered with seas of sandstone boulders and are, therefore, difficult of access. The light gray Yamna sandstone, of great resisting power, appears in this mountain section in very thick layers, and is the cause of the greater height and the bolder forms which, in places, are suggestive of high mountain ranges. The energetic weathering process, aided by the cover of winter snow, breaks up the mighty sandstone layers into great rocks, boulders, fragments and rubble. Deep fissures yawn between moss and lichen-covered boulders, many boulders rock under the foot of the wanderer, and many of them, thru caving-in and thru accumulation, have formed natural chambers and hollows. The rocky ridges, covered with seas of boulders, are Arshizia, the Gorgan peaks, whence comes the name of the entire mountain range. The seas of boulders and rubblestone are called Zekit or Grekhit.

In the highest groups of the Gorgani Range (especially in the Svidovetz) are found also distinct traces of the glacial age, glacial excavations with small lakes or with swamps that have taken the place of lakes.

A splendid, only slightly thinned dress of virgin forest covers the Gorgani Chain. The lower forest section is composed of beech, ash and fir trees, the upper part of pines and stone-pines. The tree limit is very irregular and vascillates between 1100 and 1600 m. Mountain pastures are very rare, because of the seas of boulders and rubble-stone, but there are large and beautiful, though not easily accessible, stocks of mountain pines.

The last section of the Ukrainian Carpathians is called Chornohora (Black Mountains). It extends from the Prut and the Black Theiss to the Prislop Pass; to the valley of the Visheva and of the Golden Bistritza. In this wide and long mountain district we find greater morphological variety than in the mountain sections hitherto discussed. In the wide zone of the northern foothills, which separate with a distinct edge from the sub-Carpathian hills and continue into the Bukovina, we find low ridges and rounded peaks, as in the High Beskid. Only in places on peaks and valley sides piles of rock are seen. Then toward the interior of the range follows the wide vale of Zabie, imbedded in soft slate, and above it rises the mighty chain of the Chornohora, the only part of the sandstone region of the Carpathians which has high mountain formations. The chain is composed of the hard magura sandstone, rich in mica. A whole stretch of peaks here attains a height of 2000 m., the highest being the Hoverla (2058 m.). Well-formed, partly rocky ribs branch off from the main ridge on either side. The rock piles of the Shpitzi, Kisli and Kisi Ulohy, are some of the most imposing rock formations of the Carpathian sandstone region. Between the rocky ribs, finely developed glens lie on both sides of the main ridge of the Chornohora, the beds of the ancient glaciers. Waterfalls dash down the steep rock walls in silver streams — of particular interest is the cascade of the Prut under the Hoverla — and down below lie little crater lakes reflecting the patches of summer snow on the crater walls. Almost three-fourths of the year the Chornohoras are covered with snow. In summer the snow almost wholly disappears, and the beautiful carpet of flowers of the mountain pastures, only occasionally interrupted by dark green reserves of mountain-pine, spreads out over the ridges and peaks of the Chornohora. Every summer innumerable herds of cattle, small Hutzul horses and sheep are seen here. Then an intensive dairy industry enlivens the peak regions of the range for three months. The lower regions are still covered with extensive forests; in lower locations we find mixed forests here; in higher altitudes, almost pure stocks of pines.

Standing on one of the Chornohora peaks, on the Hoverla for instance, or the Petros or Pip Ivan, we see, in the near southwest, a new and strange mountain world. It is the third zone of the Chornohora Mountains, the mountain land of Marmarosh. Situated in the region of the headwaters of the Theiss and orographically related to the Chornohora, the mountains of the Marmarosh are of entirely different geological composition and have a different morphological appearance. Gneiss and other kinds of crystalline slate, permo-Triassic and Jurassic conglomerates and limestones, as well as eruptive rock of older and of more recent date, lend great geological and morphological variety to the Marmarosh Mountains. The high mountain character here is even more marked than in the Chornohoras. Rocky peaks, ridges, mountain walls, numerous craters, with small glacial lakes, adorn the Marmarosh mountains, which rise higher than 1900 m.: Pip Ivan, Farko, Mikhalek, Petros, Troiaga. Toward the southeast the range wanders over into South Bukovina, where its last boundary-posts, the rocky peaks of Yumalen and Raren really stand on Romanian ground. And in the south, beyond the Visheva Valley, which divides the settlements of the Ukrainian Hutzuls from those of the Romanians, rises the magnificent lofty rampart of the Rodna Mountains, with its two peaks of 2300 m., Pietrosu and Ineu.

On the outside of the Carpathian curve stretches a hill country of varying breath, the sub-Carpathian hill-country, in Ukrainian: Pidhirye or Pidkarpatye. The mountain-edge of the Carpathian, which is at all points very distinct, rises steeply over the low-hill country at the foot, along an extended line in the neighborhood of the cities of Peremishl, Sambir, Drohobich, Striy, Kolomia. The Carpathian rivers leave the mountains by way of funnel-shaped valleys, bordered by boulder terraces, and spread their alluvial mounds over the low hill country. Wide stretches of meadow accompany the river courses; fields and woodland lie at a distance. The sub-Carpathian hill-country is built up of Miocene gray clays which, along the edge of the Carpathians, contain an enormous treasure of petroleum, ozokerite, kitchen salt and potash salts. Boulders lie on the clay, not only along the rivers, but also on the hilltops — traces of old watercourses, which transported Carpathian and northern rubble-stone toward the east in the direction of the Dniester. The yellowish cover of loam and loess lies over the whole, and its surface-layer, abounding in vegetable soil, is, in places, very fertile.

The sub-Carpathian hill country reaches to the two sub-Carpathian plains in the north — the Vistula and the Dniester Plain. Only along the European main divide a tongue of hill-country projects in the direction of Lemberg. In the glacial period, watercourses of great volume flowed directly across this hill-country divide, which, as might be expected, is now completely cleft by the bifurcation of the Vishnia, depositing considerable masses of rubble-stone and sand. Thru destruction of forests, the sands have become subject to wind action and dreary landscapes of sand-dunes have been formed.

Only the southeastern reaches of the Vistula Plain, extending along the San River to Peremishl are part of Ukrainian territory. The low loam bags, which lie between sandy and swampy valleys of the San, form the only rises of ground in this plain, which borders in the northeast on the spurs of the Rostoch.

The Dniester Plain extends in a broad ribbon along the river from the place where it leaves the mountains to the delta of the Striy. Its western part is a single great swamp region, a one-time large lake. The rivers flow on flat dams, and when the melting snows come and the rains of early summer, they overflow their banks and flood the swampy plains far and near. In some years the swamp region changes into a lake for days and weeks. In the dry season only a few swamp lakes remain, but the entire region remains a swamp and produces only a poor sour hay. Settlements lie only on the high banks of the rivers.

The eastern part of the Dniester Plain extends beyond the great alluvial mounds of the Striy River, and then reaches over into the broad valley of the Dniester, which ends in the Podolian Plateau at the point where the river enters. The eastern Dniester Plain is not very swampy, and only in places do ravines, swamps, and old river beds accompany the river course. For the most part pretty meadows, fields and woods lie on the thick sub-layer of rubble-stone and river-loam.

If the Carpathians represent a primeval section of Ukrainian ground, the mountain ranges of Crimea and the Caucasus were entirely strange to the Ukrainians not so very long ago. How many Ukrainian slaves, in the time of Tartar oppression, cursed the rocky-wall of the Yaila which separated them from their beloved home. How discontented was the enslaved remainder of the Zaporogs when transported to the Western Caucasus.

Now the conditions are quite changed. The great colonizing movement of the Ukrainians touched the Yaila as much as twenty years ago, and has extended the frontiers of the Ukrainian settlements along the outer mountains of the Caucasus to the Caspian Sea. And the once strange, hostile mountain-worlds have opened their doors to Ukrainian colonization.

The Yaila Mountains of Crimea are, in comparison with the Carpathians, a small mountain system hardly 150 km. long and 35 km. wide. They lie in three parallel ranges, separated by longitudinal valleys, along the southeast shores of the peninsula. The northern declivities of all the ridges are gently sloping, the southern ones steep. The southern main range exceeds a height of 1500 m. with its peaks, Chatirdagh, Roman-chosh, and Demir Kapu. This main ridge, which declines toward the sea in steep precipices, is flat and rocky on top, strewn with rockcraters; it bears the name Yaila and serves as a lean mountain pasture. Deep gorges cut the rough surface of the summit and divide it into single table mountains.

The mountains of Crimea, like the Carpathians, are mountains of plication. They are composed of Jurassic, chalk, and Miocene-layers. The large blocks of lime of the Jurassic, which rest on softer slates and clays, form the main ridge of the mountains. Besides craters, we find, in the limestone mountains of the Yaila, impassable furrows (German 'Karrenbildungen') and numerous hollows.

Very picturesque is the magnificent precipitous decline of the main range of the Yaila to the sea. Here the entire southern part of the range has sunk in great ravines and the resisting power of the eruptive rocks which appear here has created a coastal mountain landscape of great beauty. Protected by the mountain wall from northerly winds, a Mediterranean flora has been able to develop here at the southern foot of the range, while beautiful leafy forests partly cover the declines of the mountains.

On the peninsula of Kerch, which forms the eastern extreme of Crimea, a low steppe-like hill-country extends seemingly as a prolongation of the Yaila Range. The new tertiary clays are here laid in flat folds, which are more closely related to the Caucasus. Here, and on the quite similarly formed Taman peninsula, we find many small cone-shaped mud volcanoes which emit gases, smoke, and thinly flowing blue-gray mud from their miniature craters.

The magnificent lofty range of the Caucasus forms the boundary-post of the Ukraine on the east. Only the western part of the mountain system lies within Ukrainian territory. We shall, therefore, discuss it quite briefly.

The Caucasian Mountain system, which is 1100 km. in length, lies like a huge wall of rock between Europe and Asia. Most geographers consider the Caucasus as part of the latter continent, which is correct in so far as these mountains show many characteristics of Asiatic mountain ranges. First of all they are hard to cross, much harder than the highest mountains of Europe, the Alps. Along a stretch of 700 km., the ridge of the Caucasus descends only twice to a level of 3000 m. On the other hand; the Caucasus is not wide — on the average only 150 km. — and at the point where the Grusinian army road crosses the range, barely 60 km. Then, the Caucasus, like many mountain ranges of Asia, stretches in a straight line from the peninsula of Taman to the peninsula of Apsheron, famous for its abundance of petroleum.

The Caucasus is a plication-formed mountain range composed of folded crystalline and sedimentary rock of varying ages. Along huge ravines, the entire southern part of the range has sunk down, so that the highest crystalline central zone of the range declines directly and very steeply toward the south. The highest Caucasus peaks are old extinct volcanoes, set over the basic mountains; the Elbrus (5630 m.), at the source of the Kuban and the Kasbek (5040 m.), at the source of the Terek. Proof that the subterranean powers are still active are the numerous tectonic earthquakes of Transcaucasia.

The main chain of the Caucasus possesses, besides the volcano peaks, many rocky granite peaks 4000 — 5000 m. in height, and, besides these, hundreds of lower peaks, all of which find their counterparts in the Alps. The present glaciation of the Caucasus is very considerable, while that of the glacial period was also very extensive and determined the present mountain forms of the Caucasus. Only the most beautiful ornament of the one-time glacial landscape is lacking in the Caucasus — the lakes, which are so abundant in the Alps.

All the larger Caucasus rivers rise as milky glacial brooks in the main range. Then, by way of deep cross-valleys, they break thru the lower ranges, which face the main ridge in several rows, and are composed of sedimentary rock formations of Jurassic, Cretaceous , and old-tertiary age. Their crests and peaks become constantly lower and more rounded toward the north. Beautiful mountain pastures and thick virgin forests, full of animals that may be hunted, cover the mountains.

In the country at the foot of the Caucasus, a low hill-region is spread, which consists mainly of new-tertiary layers abounding in petroleum. At the Ponto-Caspian divide, the hill-district and plateau of Piatihorsk and Stavropol, which is composed of recent lime formations, projects from the Caucasus. From a height of 600 m. this structure declines slowly in flat hills toward the west, north and east to the Ponto-Caspian steppe-plain, in which lies the famous Manich Furrow. The Manich, or rather Calaus River rises like the Kuma in the Plateau of Stavropol and separates, in the Furrow, into two branches. The one flows thru extended Manich lakes toward the northeast into the Don River, and, incidentally, into the Sea of Azof; the other turns toward the south to the Kuma River and the Caspian Sea. But its waters reach this goal very rarely; the burning sun and the sandy soil of the Caspian steppe rob the little river of its small supply of water.

The Ukrainian Plateau Country

The Carpathians, the Yaila and the Caucasus, are immovable boundary-walls, marking the southern borders of the Ukraine. On its wide surface there are only these narrow zones of mountain country. All the remaining territory of our fatherland is occupied by plateaus and plains. Upon these the Ukrainian nation has lived since the dawn of history. . Not cloud-capped highlands, but level, lightly undulating plateaus, furrowed by picturesque river valleys and immeasurable plains, are characteristic of the Ukraine.

Between the Carpathians and the Ural Mountains there extends an immense space which once bore the name of Sarmatian Plain and is now generally called the Russian Tableland, though the name East European Lowland would be geographically the most fitting. In this space, which embraces half the surface of Europe, only one group of hills in the Pokutia rises above 500 m., and only one small part of the Podolia above 400 m. The entire remaining space of Eastern Europe, with slight exceptions, keeps below the 300 or even 200 m. level.

In the northern part of Eastern Europe, the lands over 200 m. high take up very little room. Like great flat islands, they rise gently from the spacious cool lowlands. In Central Europe the surface of the high part of the flat country is relatively the greatest, but these rises of ground are so insignificant and the transitions to the low plain so imperceptible, that the main features of the surface of this part of Europe were only discovered in the second half of the Nineteenth Century.

In the Ukrainian south of Eastern Europe the character of the ground elevations is different. They are the highest of all in Eastern Europe and separate very distinctly, largely by means of steep edges, from the surrounding plains. The genuine plateau landscape is the type of landscape peculiar to the Ukraine.

The Ukrainian plateau group, the real morphological nucleus of the land about which its borderlands are gathered, extends from the sub-Carpathian country and the Polish Vistula-region to the Sea of Azof and the Donets River. It consists of the following plateaus: Rostoche, Podolia, Pokutye (Bessarabia), Volhynia, Dnieper Plateau and Donets Plateau.

We shall begin our survey of the Ukrainian plateaus with the Podolia. The Podolian Plateau is the most massive of all the plateaus in the Ukraine, the highest, and the one possessing the most distinctive features of a heavily cut high plain.

If, leaving the Carpathians, we overlook the surrounding country from the edge of the mountain range, we observe behind the wide stretch of the sub-Carpathian hills and plains, just on the horizon, wide, flat elevations, which obstruct the horizon in the north. These are the edges of the Podolian Plateau.

The western boundary of Podolia is formed by the wide valley of the little Vereshitza River, a valley covered with swampy meadows and large ponds. On the south and southeast, Podolia is bounded by the valley of the Dniester River, which is first wide and then narrows down to a canon. Between the lower course of the Dniester and the Boh, the Podolian Plateau gradually leads into the Pontian Steppe-plain. On the north and northeast, Podolia is bounded by the rocky valley of the Boh and then by the river divide, which extends toward the west, between the basins of the Dniester and Dnieper Rivers. Near its limit begins the well-known steep edge which forms the decline of the Podolian Plateau to the plain of the Buh. From Brody to Lemberg, the northern boundary of Podolia is very clearly marked by this steep edge.

Despite its distinct plateau character, Podolia is by no means lacking in beautiful landscapes. The northern, steep, border of the Plateau occasionally rises for 200 m. above the swampy Buh plain, and its height above sea level is in some places 470 m. The whitish-gray chalk-marl which forms the basis of this land grade glitters from a distance, exposed thru the action of the water, which flows down the steep side. The Miocene sandstone lying above shows fantastic rock piles and ravines. Beautiful beech forests are to a great extent still maintaining themselves on the steep edge. From a distance, everything produces the illusion of a high forest-covered chain of hills. On climbing it, however, we see in the south only an unbounded lightly undulating elevated plain, with flat valleys filling the entire view.

Toward the southwest, too, Podolia declines with a similar steep border, but this one is neither so uniform nor so high and picturesque. These steep borders owe their origin to a recent uprising, which has affected the Podolian Plateau, especially in the west, since the glacial period. To the same cause the picturesque, beautifully wooded, eroded hill-country of the Opilye owes its origin, a section which extends southeast from Lemberg in the regions of Rohatin and Berezani to the Dniester, and which, with its peaks, reaches a height of 440 m. Most remarkable, however, is the long chain of rocky hills which extends from. Brody to the southeast toward Kamenetz Podilski. This chain of hills, which bears the name of Toutri, is marked on all maps by the wilfully chosen name of Medobori. The limestone rock, which contains a great amount of fossils, forms fantastic crags on the more than 400 m. peaks of the hill-chain, which look down upon the land like old fortresses. The entire chain of hills is a new-tertiary coral and briozone reef which, after the withdrawal of the sea, remained behind as a long rock dyke.

Beyond this hilly region the entire Podolian Plateau has a flat, undulating surface. Beginning as far back as the upper Sereth and Sbruch we find typical steppe-plains. The farther southwest, the more flat, undulating and steppe-like sections do we meet, until finally the Podolian elevation gradually merges in the Pontian steppe-plain.

Much variety and beauty is given to the appearance of the Podolian landscape by the valleys of the Dniester tributaries on the left. In their upper parts they are wide and have flat, swampy ground, many ponds and bogs and gentle valley declines. In its further course the river begins to cut in more and more deeply, the valley becomes constantly narrower and deeper and winds on in regular bends, the valley-sides become higher and steeper, bare walls of rock take the place of the soft green slopes. We are in a Podolian "yar", in a miniature canon.

In the sides of the yars the geologic history of the Podilia is engraved in imperishable letters. The river has sawed the plateau thru as though with a gigantic saw, and has exposed the various layers of stone. As a rule they lie nearly horizontally above one another.

The oldest rock species of Podolia are the granite-gneisses, which were folded and disturbed in pre-Cambrian times. The lines of the folds and breaks stretch principally north to south. Granite composes the rocks of the Dniester rapids near Yampol and the numerous rapids of the Boh River, in whose rocky vale this primitive rock formation appears distinctively. On the granite base, almost horizontally, slightly turned toward the southwest, lie dark slate and limestone, upper Silurian at first in West Podolia, then the Devonic layers, of which the old red sandstone attracts the eye most of all, because of the dark red coloring which it gives to the steep walls of the Podolian canons. These are followed by chalk layers, and, last of all, by recent tertiary formation whose gypsums form picturesque groups of rocks on the heights of the Yari walls. In the mighty gypsum stores of Podolia may be found many a large, beautiful cave, with wonderful alabaster stalactites.

All tributaries on the left side of the Dniester, beginning at the Zolota Lipa, flow into yari-canons of this sort. The most beautiful and magnificent is the canon of the Dniester, whose walls often exceed a height of 200 m. It cuts thru the high plateau in adventurous windings, every curve revealing new, beautiful prospects over the high, concave, steep edge, torn by ravines, and the gently rising convex banks. In deep gorges the yari of the tributaries open into the yar of the main stream. Between the defiles stretches the flat, hardly undulating plain. In the summer only endless waving grain-steppes present themselves to the view of the traveler, only here and there a little wood appears on the horizon, or a lone farm. Suddenly the wood seems to end, the traveler is confronted by a deep, steppe-walled valley, down the sides of which climbs the road. And below, on the silvery river, amid the green of the orchards, lies village after village.

The further to the east, the more frequent do the yari become, and the balkas (gorges) similar to them but smaller; yet these are not so deep and picturesque. In the regions of Tiraspol Ananiv the entire plateau surface is very profusely cut by these defiles. In the district of Ananiv the balkas take up one-seventh of the entire surface. The plateau is cut up by these water crevasses into innumerable narrow fens.

The balka, like the yar, owes its existence to the erosive activity of flowing waters. On the Dniester we see, on both sides of its deep yars, great masses of old river boulders, which lie on the summit of the plateau beneath the thick cover of loam. They are boulder deposits of the pre-glacial Dniester. Later, when the recent raising of the Ukrainian plateau group began, and it occurred with particular force in the Podolian Plateau, the rivers cut in, and in the course of thousands of years formed their present picturesque defiles.

The entire surface of the Podolian Plateau is covered with a thick mantle of loess, which was formed in the desert and steppe period following the glacial age. In the manner in which the loess is heaped up, in the symmetry of the river valleys, whose western declivities are regularly steeper, in the general arrangement and formation of the valleys of Podolia, the great influence of winds may be distinctly recognized.

The uppermost loess layer has been transformed throughout Podolia into the famous black earth (Chomozem). Hence Podolia has for ages been famous for its fertility. "In Podolia," says an old Ukrainian proverb, "bread grows on the hedge-posts and the hedges are of plashed sausages." On the other hand, Podolia suffers greatly from lack of forests. The large areas of forest which still existed in the 16th and 17th Centuries have now divided to small woods. The effects of forest destruction were not slow. Many springs and brooks have dried up, the rivers have languished, so that in particularly dry summers there is often a dearth of water. On the other hand, after the cutting down of the forests, began the destructive activity of the gorges, which extend after every strong rain and are able in a short time to transform a rich agricultural district into a maze of ravines.

Between the Podolian Plateau and the hilly sub-Carpathian country lies the Pocutian-Bessarabian Plateau. The far-stretching narrow plateau section which lies between the valleys of the Dniester and the Prut is called Pokutye (land in the corner) in the west, while in the east the name Bessarabia (properly Bassarabia) is commonly used. In the west the plateau country reaches the valleys of the Bistritza and Vorona in the sub-Carpathian region; in the southeast it passes over into Pontian steppe-plain. On the Dniester one sees almost no difference between the character of Podolia on the left bank and of Pocutia or Bessarabia on the right. On both sides the same valley slopes, composed of the same rock layers — except that the one on the right bank is more compact, because the Dniester receives only few and small tributaries on this side. Only at some distance from the course of the Dniester do the peculiarities of the Pokutian-Bessarabian Plateau appear to the view.

The western part of the plateau, which bears the name of Pokutye and extends to the east as far as the hill-group of Berdo-Horodishche, has a level, very flat, undulating surface, And yet it is a typical karstenite country, affected by the existence of great strata of gypsum. The region has a very great number of funnel-shaped depressions which are called Vertep and are altogether analogous to the Carso dolomites. They originated thru the dissolving action of the subterranean water in the gypsum strata. The funnel walls are always steep on one side, gray gypsum rocks rise like walls over the bottom of the funnel, which is often occupied by a small lake. Many brooks disappear in the karstenite funnels, to continue their course as subterranean streams. Nor does Pokutye lack other marks of a karstenite region. The action of the subterranean waters has, by dissolving the gypsum masses, formed large caves, which are famous for their beautiful stalactites of white alabaster. The best known are the cave of Lokitki, near Tovmach, and in the neighboring South Podolia, the caves of Bilche Zolote and the recently discovered magnificent caves of Crivche.

However, the karstenite country of the Pokutye cannot bear comparison with the karstenite regions of Krain, Istria and Croatia. Gypsum is not limestone, and its strength is insignificant as compared with strength of the lime-stone in genuine karstenite regions. A genuine karstenite formation therefore does not exist in Pokutye, and a thick cover of clay is only in exceptional cases broken by gypsum rocks.

The Pokutian Plateau is much lower than the Podolian. Only in isolated places does it attain a height of 370 — 380 m. and becomes constantly lower toward the east. But north of Chernivtzi (Czernowitz) it rises to a height which we look for in vain in all the rest of the Ukrainian plateau group. The wooded hill-group of the Berdo Horodishche here reaches 515 m., the greatest height above sea level to be found between the Carpathians and the Ural. In the east, Berdo Horodishche passes over into the chain of hills of Khotin, which attains a height of 460 m. and marks the eastern end of the Pocutia. The southeastern long and wide Bessarabian section of the plateau is divided into far-reaching narrow marshes by the flat valleys of the Prut and Reut Rivers. The Prut-Dniester river divide attains a height of 420 m. (Megura hill) in the headwater region of the Reut south of the city of Bilzi. The southeastern part of the Bessarabian plateau consists of very numerous low marshes, which lie between flat valleys. The plateau becomes constantly lower and flatter and passes imperceptibly over into the Pontian Steppe-plain.

The third member of the Ukrainian plateau group is the Rostoche. Looking from the summit of the castle mountain of Lemberg, famous for its beautiful prospect, we see, just behind the broad valley of the Poltva River, a chain of high wooded hills which stretch toward the northeast. They form the spurs of the Rostoche.

The Rostoche, called also the Lemberg-Lublin Ridge, lies, a profusely cut, hilly, narrow plateau, which is bounded on the one side by the San and Vistula Plain, on the other side by the low country of the Buh. Toward the southwest the Rostoche has a steep rim, which, as a matter of fact, is rather insignificant-looking; toward the east it resolves itself into parallel hill-ridges, which gradually become lower and between which lie marshy valleys.

The southern part of the Rostoche, which merges with the Podolian Plateau near Lemberg and extends to the broad, sandy and marshy glacial river valley of Tanva toward the northwest, is a plateau transformed into an erosive hill-country. The highest hills attain a height of 400 m. The river valleys are in general flat; only along the steep borders of the plateau are they cut deep. The steep western border is very picturesque, with its deep gorges and loess walls. Many vigorous springs appear here, among them the well-known Parashka spring, from which a heavy column of water rises from time to time.

The oldest rock layer of the Rostoche is the chalk-marl. Above it lie, in almost undisturbed horizontal layers, Miocene limestone, sandstone, clay, sand, Diluvial loam, while sand and broken stone with many boulders, which are of unmistakable northern origin and were transported by glaciers and streams of the ice period as far as the southern part of the Rostoche, form a heavy cover everywhere. The ground is not very fertile, sand and marl soil being particularly wide-spread.

The northern part of the Rostoche, beyond the Tanva valley, is a broad, slightly undulating plateau, which, in its highest part, reaches a height of only 340 m. The western edge of the plateau is distinct and steep and declines in places 100 m. to the low country of the Vistula. Toward the north the plateau surface declines very gradually and merges almost imperceptibly into the plain of the Pidlassye. The river valleys, as those of the Buh, Vepr, are broad, flat and marshy.

The geological constitution of the northern Rostoche is almost entirely similar to that of the southern part. Its soil cover, too, is not very fertile, and only great woods have survived, especially in the districts of the old morainic sand and loam. Only in the neighborhood of the Pidlassye does the soil become more fertile. For the configuration of surface of the Rostoche, the recent post-glacial raising of the ground has also been of great significance, although here it was not nearly so intensive as in Podolia.

The Volhynian Plateau extends over a broad space between the Buh in the west and the Teterev in the east, between the swampy plain of the Polissye in the north and the Dniester-Dnieper watershed and the upper Boh valley in the south. The Volhynian Plateau does not possess the compactness of the Podolian or Rostoche Plateau. The swampy lowland of the Polissye extends along the rivers into the heart of Volhynia, thereby dividing its plateau country into several sections of different size. Likewise, the inner structure and geological constitution of Volhynia is variable. Western Volhynia, situated between the Buh and Horin Rivers, has a sub-layer of chalk marl, which is capped in places by layers of clay and sandstone and limestone of recent tertiary date. Eastern Volhynia lies entirely in the region of the primeval Ukrainian Horst, whose plicate granite-gneiss sub-layer is covered by old tertiary deposits. In this tectonically disturbed region we meet with traces of early volcanic action. Near Berestovetz, Horoshki, etc., species of eruptive rock appear as signs of radical disturbances of the earth's surface.

The surface soil of Volhynia is black soil only in the south. Beyond that we find here sandy soil, white earth and loamy soil, as signs of a one-time glacial covering and the action of fluvio-glacial waters. Many regions of loamy ground are rich in vegetable soil and not without considerable fertility.

The lowest part of the Volhynian Plateau is the western part, which lies between the broad, marshy, flat valleys of the Buh and the Stir. The slightly undulating, almost level plateau surface, which declines imperceptibly toward the Polissye, here just attains a height of 200 m., while the next section, between the Stir and the Horin is the highest part of Volhynia. As an extension of the above-mentioned northern edge of Podolia, the Kremianetz-Ostroh hill-country intrudes between the two rivers. Over 400 m. high, near the city of Kremianetz, it declines toward the north, a steep section torn by gorges and ravines. Near Dubno, the plateau is cut into a picturesque hill country with a maximum height of 340 m. The hills of Volhynia have steep, often rocky declines and flattened rocky peaks.

North of Rivne and Lutzk they finally begin to be lower and more rounded, then they dwindle to a flat billowy tract of land, until, at the borders of the Polissye, we see only an almost perfect plain.

Between the Horin and Sluch Rivers, the Volhynian Plateau becomes more uniform. Its surface is flat, and broad valleys of the rivers which flow toward the east, forming numerous ponds, part it slightly. Only in the south is a height of more than 300 m. reached; in the north, where the granite sub-layer appears everywhere, especially in river valleys, barely 200 m.

The eastern part of the Volhynian Plateau extends, at first, as a narrow plateau zone between the valleys of the Boh and the Teterev on one side and of the Sluch on the other. Then the plateau spreads out like a fan toward the north. At the source of the Boh and the Sluch, the plateau reaches a height of 370 m.; at the sources of the Teterev, 340 m. Here the surface is level, except that here and there low, gently-rounded hills arise. In the broad, northern part, the Volhynian Plateau becomes much lower and finally separates into individual plateau islands, as, for example, near Novhorod, Volinski, Zitomir, Ovruch, which rise gently from the marshy lowlands.

The valleys of the Volhynian rivers, broad, flat, with gentle slopes and marshy bottoms, differentiate the Volhynian landscape most strongly from the Podolian. The Volhynian landscape presents a view of flat, wooded hills, slowly flowing streams between flat banks, marshes and marshy meadows, sandy ground — all signs of the proximity of the Polissye.

The Dnieper Plateau has the outlines of a longish, irregular polygon. On the northwest it is bounded by the rocky valley of the Teterev, on the southwest by the Boh River, on the south and southwest by the Pontian steppe-plain, on the northeast by the Dnieper River.

This great space, however, does not constitute a uniform plateau. The broad river valleys and broad depressions which traverse the plateau have parted it into several sections. Only the uniform sub-layer and the geologic character, as well as the uniform appearance of the landscape, determine the natural unity of the region.

The sub-layer of the Dnieper Plateau is made up of the primitive granite-gneiss clod of the Ukrainian horst. The granite-gneiss formations were folded in the Precambrian period. The folds and quarries stretch principally from north to south, and appear very distinctly near Zitomir and Korsun, and at the rapids of the Dnieper. The Mesozoic layers also, which lie close to the granite-horst, are folded at Trekhtimiriv. The tertiary layers, which form a thin cover over the granite, lie mostly in undisturbed horizontal lines. Only along the right, steep bank of the Dnieper we see them folded and broken thru by quarries. In the neighborhood of the Shevchenko barrow they appear most distinctly.

The occurrence of eruptive rock in the south of the plateau, appearing in mound-shaped flat hills, is, however, connected only with the old disturbances in the horst.

This species of rock of the Dnieper Plateau appears almost solely in the declivities of the valleys and balkas. Otherwise it is covered everywhere by an immense mantle of loam, loess, and chornozyom. The glacial deposits, whose southern boundary passes through Zhitomir, Tarashcha, Chihirin, and Kreminchuk, present, in the territory of the Dnieper Plateau, examples of genuine fluvio-glacial moraine, as well as sands of no great depth, and in rather erratic distribution.

The configuration of surface of the Dnieper Plateau is varied enough. The greatest height (300 m.) is reached south of Berdichiv. Toward the east and southeast the plateau becomes constantly lower. This lowering, however, does not proceed regularly, different sections of the plateau presenting different conditions in this respect.

The section projecting furthest toward the west to the Sob and Ross Rivers is a level, slightly divided plateau, with a maximum height of 300 m. The tributaries of the Teterev, Irpen and Ross flow slowly in flat valleys thru whole rows of ponds. Where they enter the plain they finally have steep granite banks and rocky beds. The plateau section between the Sob and Ross Rivers in the west and the Siniukha and Huili Tikich in the east has more valleys. The river valleys and balkas are deeper, their sides rockier, and thru them the plateau is transformed in places into chains and groups of flat hills. But this plateau section is lower than the preceding one, attaining only 260m. Still lower is the section between the Siniukha and the Inhuletz. It attains a height of only 240 m. and is very even. The granite sub-layer appears here even in the level steppe; the valleys and balkas are cut deep with rocky bottoms and rocky slopes.

Besides these three sections, the Dnieper plateau embraces two long strips of plateau which stretch along the right bank of the Dnieper. The one is surrounded by the Dnieper, Irpen, and Ross Rivers, the other stretches from the source of the Tiasmin to the rapids of the Dnieper. The height of these strips of plateau is negligible, the highest points attaining just 190 m. near Kiev, 240 m. between Trekhtimirev and Kaniv, 250 m. near Chihirin, and barely 180 m. at the first of the rapids. The steep declivity with which the plateau strips descend to the Dnieper plain emphasize the antithesis between plateau and plain in this region very markedly.

The difference in level surpasses 100 m. near Kiev and Katerinoslav and 150 m. near the Shevchenko barrow, not far from Kaniv. The declivity of the right bank of the Dnieper is much torn by gorges, and everywhere we see picturesque rock piles. The steep bank appears, especially to a plain-dweller, like a chain of mountains and is even called "the mountains of the Dnieper." The idea of a "mountain bank" of the Dnieper, therefore, need not be rejected outright. The aspect of Kiev and the Shevchenko barrow is one of the most beautiful in the entire Ukraine.

On ascending this "mountain chain," however, which appears so imposing from the left bank of the river, and looking toward the west, we find before us only a slightly undulating plateau surface, with rounded dome-shaped hills and deep valleys, belonging to the right-hand tributaries of the Dnieper.

The nature of the landscape of the Dnieper Plateau is, consequently, different from that of the Volhynian or Podolian. The lightly undulating plateau, gradually becoming flatter toward the east and south and broken up only near the river valleys into flat dome-shaped hills; the valleys of the rivers, wide, not deep, and yet with rocky river beds and rocky slopes, with loess gorges and walls; the mighty Dnieper with its picturesque mountain shores; the never-ending grain steppes crossed by little woods, mohilas and long, extended old walls of rock — this is the landscape view of the old Kiev country, the heart of the Ukraine.

The Dnieper Plateau becomes constantly lower toward the southeast, without, however, losing its original landscape nature in the least. Near the Dnieper rapids we see, quite distinctly, that the Miocene-covered sub-layer of granite of the Ukrainian plateau group stretches straight across the river and is the cause of its rapids. But the differences in level at that point are no longer different from the variations in a plain. In the region of the source of the Samara and along the Donets the land finally rises above the 200 m. level again. We are now in the Donets Plateau.

As near as Isium we confront the first boundary post of the plateau in the steep chalk rocks of Mt. Kremianetz on the Donets River. Further down we see the picturesque rocks of the famous monastery of "the Holy Hills." All these are parts of the northern verge of. the plateau, which is its limit on the north. Near Slavianoserbsk and Luhansk this picturesque border reaches a height of 70 m. The course of the Donets also forms the eastern boundary; the southern boundary is formed by the small strip of the Pontian Plain on the shore of the Sea of Azof; the western border is denoted by the plain on the left bank of the Dnieper.

The Donets Plateau stretches in a long flat ridge from N. W. W. to S. E. E., and extends a flat side-ridge to either side. The longer one goes southward, almost as far as Mariupol, the other northward to Bakhmut. The surface of the plateau is very level and declines very flatly toward all sides. Only light billows of land traverse the steppe surface, which is strewn with countless tumuli. In the south these hills often have a core of granite. The river valleys have steep, although not high slopes. They divide the uniform surface of the heights but slightly. From the surface configuration one could never guess that at this point there was once a mountain range which fell victim to the exogenous forces of the earth's water and air blanket. Only an insignificant part of the surface of the Donets Plateau lies more than 300 m. high; the highest point, Tovsta Mohila, barely reaching 370 m.

In its inner structure it is entirely different from all other parts of the Ukrainian group of plateaus. The entire south and west of the plateau is composed of folded granite-gneiss, of the Azof part of the horst, capped by a thin tertiary layer, and in many places (especially between Volnovakha and Kalmius) broken thru by eruptive rock formations. Next to these, in the north and south of the plateau, lie limestone, slate, clay and sandstone formations of Devonian, Carbonic, Permian, Jurassic and Cretaceous age, folded and broken thru by ravines. Over this leveled basic range lie the horizontal tertiary layers. The great development of the coal-containing carbon layers gives to the monotonous, only recently bared steppe elevation of the Donets Plateau, great significance for the industrial life of all Easter/i Europe. The coal-fields of the Donets Plateau, 23,000 km. in size, are the richest and most important coal region of the present Russian Empire. Thanks to these "black diamonds," a forest of factory chimneys (sparsely sown as yet, to be sure) has sprung up within the most recent past in the black steppe, where the anthracite and pit-coal collieries furnish the desired nourishment. Besides this, the Permian layers of the Donets Plateau hold great deposits of rock-salt. Here, too, lie the only quicksilver mines of the Russian Empire in Europe. Rich copper deposits are being exploited here, besides which we must mention the occurrence of zinc, silver, lead, and even gold in this Donets region, which has not yet been sufficiently explored by the mining prospector.

The Donets Plateau forms the easternmost member of the Ukrainian plateau group, which constantly narrows toward the east. Outside of this, the group rises only at the southernmost spurs of the Central Russian Plateau above the 200 m. level. These regions of the Ukraine, however, we may safely discuss in our description of the Dnieper Plain, for the transition from this plain to the Central Russian elevation is so imperceptible and gradual, the plateau character so undecided, that even from the scientific morphological point of view, one can hardly find any difference between the plain landscape and the neighboring combined elevated surfaces.

The Ukrainian Plain Country

The Ukrainian plateau group, which passes thru the Ukraine in its entire length is hemmed in on both sides by two plain regions. Without a break they accompany the extended plateau groups in the north and south, uniting finally on the left bank of the Don and the country below the Caucasus. The northern plain district accompanies the northern decline of the Ukrainian horst, concealing a tectonically disturbed substratum; the southern district accompanies the northern border of the Black Sea and parts the broken chain of plicate mountains from the plateau group of the Ukraine.

The northern plain district of the Ukraine joins directly on to the Polish lowlands, and, indirectly, to the North German lowland.

The first section of the northern plain district is called Pidlassye (Podlakhia, land on the Polish border). Its northern boundary consists of the southern limits of the White Russian Plateau; the western boundary of the flat elevations near Sidlez and Bilsk; on the south the plain borders on the spurs of the Rostoche; in the east the boundary is the Buh-Pripat divide, which is only 170 m. high. The surface of the Pidlassye is very even, only slightly undulating in places on the north and south borders. The river valleys are very broad and flat. Only the great forest (the well-known Biloveza forest lies here) and the water-courses bring variety into the monotonous country. The main stream of the Pidlassye, the Buh, as well as its tributaries have the character of genuine lowland rivers. They flow thru their over-great valleys in great turns, divide into many arms, and form innumerable old river beds. Besides these we find, in southern Pidlassye, a large number of lakes and many swamps and moors which mark the sites of former lakes.

The chalk and tertiary substratum appears only in very few places, the rest being covered everywhere by sand and loam, which include boulders and rubble of Finnic-Scandinavian origin. These are traces of the great (second) glacial period of Northern Europe, which covered the entire region of the Pidlassye with glacial ice. The lakes are moraine-lakes. The ice of the glacial period did not reach Pidlassye. At that time a broad primeval river valley formed here as an extension of the primeval Vistula river valley. In this valley the water from the melting glacier flowed off to the east toward the lowland of the Polissye. The Polissye (woodland) is one of the most remarkable lands of Eastern Europe. Only a low (170 m.) and very flat divide, which is crossed without difficulty by the Dnieper-Buh ship canal, separates the Polissye from the Pidlassye. In the north the White Russian Plateau approaches, in the south the Volhynian, in the east the Polissye extends beyond the Dnieper to the spurs of the Central Russian Plateau. The region thus bounded forms an immense flat trough, in the vertical axis of which the Pripet River flows. The bottom of this trough is very flat and lies at a height of 120 — 150 m. Only in places do we find almost imperceptible rises of ground. The substratum of the Polissye is composed of chalk marl with numerous holes made by springs (vikno=window), while in the east Oligocene formations also appear. But this substratum is seen very seldom, all the rest of the Polissye being covered with diluvial sands and great swamps. The sands take in all the elevated places and form wandering or wood-covered dunes. These sandy rises of ground, together with the elevated banks of some of the rivers, afford the only sites for human abodes. All the remaining land is marshy wood, genuine forest swamps, bog or moor. The Pripet with its tributaries, the Stokhod, Stir, Hornin, Ubort, Uz (on the right) and the Pina, Yassiolda, Sluch, and Ptich (on the left), comprises the water system of the Polissye. All these rivers flow very slowly and deposit the mud which they bring from the plateau regions surrounding the Polissye along their courses. By this means they raise their beds and their banks more and more, so that all these Polissian rivers flow upon flat dams. At the time of high water the rivers overflow their banks and flood the entire lowland far and near. At the time of the melting of snows in the spring, or of the strong showers in the early summer, the entire Polissye is transformed into an immense lake, above whose surface only the flooded forests and the settled sandy elevations of ground are visible. The spring flood lasts from two to three months, the summer floods the same length of time, for the water flows off very slowly because of the slight decline. On the highways and railroads all traffic is blocked and certain places in the Polissye may be reached only by water. During the flood period the rivers have often sought new beds, and this explains the frequency of old river beds and river branches, which are peculiar to all the Polissian river courses. And, as reminders of the floods, innumerable pools and marsh lakes remain behind.

These periodic floods are the main cause of the continuance of the Polissian swamps. We can find two main types of marshes in the Polissye. In the west and north of the region, great peat moors, with pine woods, predominate; in the south and east treeless marsh meadows, overgrown with willow brush. These are called hala. Many fictions are told by the inhabitants of the Polissye about the swamps and small marsh lakes being bottomless. For a long time it was even believed that the swamps lay lower than the normal surface of the rivers. But exact measurements have proved these "fairy tales" to be false and have shown that the swamps of the Polissye are not deep and lie at a higher level than the rivers. Since 1873 the Russian government has been working to drain the swamps and reclaim them for civilization. Up to 1898, 6000 kilometers of canals are supposed to have been dug and 32,000 square kilometers of ground made usable.

The glacial period was of great importance for the surface configuration of the Polissye. Apart from the traces of the main glacial period, which are met with frequently in southern Polissye, it was the third glacial period that was of marked significance. The water from the Baltic glacier flowed off thru the region of the present Polissye and formed a large lake with the Dnieper as its outlet. The deposits of this lake are to be found especially in the south of the Polissye basin. The lake was then gradually filled in, the northern and western tributaries bringing more sand, the southern ones mud. At the same time the Pripet River cut in more deeply, and was, therefore, constantly more able to carry the waters of the Polissye to the Dnieper River. Swamps have taken the place of the lake and have gradually covered the entire land. The many smaller lakes of the region (the largest of them are Vihonioske Ozero and Knias) are the only remains and proofs of the one-time great lake. Only at the time of high water does the Polissye recall the memory of former times.

Dreary is the Polissian landscape. The dark forest in the deep-bottomed swamps alternate with the open marsh-meadow covered with pools; with gliding flow the many-armed rivers traverse the gloomy country. On yellow-white sand-dunes stand a few log-houses amid wretched little fields and poor meadows, corduroy and brush roads stretching for miles connect small, very sparsely scattered human settlements.

The Polissye Plain also extends to the left bank of the Dnieper, and there imperceptibly passes over into a comparatively narrow lowland district which stretches along the main river of the Ukraine. This is the third member of the series of plains of the Ukraine — the Dnieper Plain. It extends toward the southeast as far as the region of the rapids (porohi) of the Dnieper and rises slowly toward the northeast, passing over into the Central Russian Plateau. The transition takes place so imperceptibly that the difference in the nature of the country only becomes apparent at the furthest bounds of Ukrainian territory, which practically lie in the southern spurs of the Central Russian Plateau.

The Dnieper Plain is quite level only along the river itself. Every year a strip of the plain, in places 10 km. wide, is flooded by the Dnieper River, wherefore it is full of old river beds and swamps, on the Desna and near Cherkassy, where the lowland, too, enters upon the right Dnieper bank, and also of sand-dunes. Near Chernihiv and Uizin the landscape is quite Polissian and the name Polissye, too, is often used here to denote the region. Toward the southeast the Polissian character begins to gradually disappear. Black earth takes the place of the sandy soil, the forest mantle becomes constantly thinner, and the flat, undulating steppe-plain, with its innumerable barrows and plate-shaped depressions of ground, where, in springtime, small steppe lakes glisten in the sunlight, increases very rapidly.

The river valleys, along which the Dnieper Plain intrudes far into the Central Russian Plateau, are very wide valley slopes on the right, and flat slopes on the left side. Sand, swamps and forest terraces cover the flat valley bottoms, which are flooded every spring.

At the porohs of the Dnieper the country rises much higher than at Pereyaslav or Kreminchuk, where the Dnieper Plain rises barely 50 m. above sea-level. At the porohs the landscape on both sides is that of a low rock-plateau. The picturesque rocks of the Dnieper banks, the rapids and ledges of rock in the river bed, everywhere remind us that here the Ukrainian Horst is crossed by the main stream of the Ukraine. Not until we get down to the Zaporozhe (land below the rapids) do we find the genuine lowland character again — in the Pontian Steppe-plain.

The transition of the Dnieper Plain to the southern spurs of the Central Russian Plateau is marked only by the rising of the valley slopes of the tributaries of the Dnieper in this region. Beyond that, the surface of the high bog, lying between the rivers, remains as flat and level as on the Dnieper and below the 200 m. level. Moreover, the spurs of the Central Russian elevation nowhere within Ukrainian territory attain the level of 300 m. The spur between the Dnieper and the Desna barely reaches a height of 230 — 240 m.; near the high Desna bank, the spur between the Desna and the Sem barely 260 m. About the sources of the Sem, Psiol and Donets, the country attains a summit height of 280 m.; between the upper Donets and Don only 250 — 260 m. From these highest regions the country declines imperceptibly but steadily toward the southwest, south and southeast.

The general nature of the land in the region of the southern spur of the Central Russian Plateau is entirely analogous to that of the neighboring Dnieper Plain, except that the river valleys are more deeply cut. The right valley-side descends to the river in a steep slope, furrowed by water rifts. The broad, flat valley bottom is occupied by river branches and old river beds, marshes and marsh meadows, sand areas or dunes. The left bank rises very gently, and we at last come upon the level, or at most slightly undulating surface of the water-shed, between two rivers. It, in turn, declines suddenly to the neighboring river and the succession of land-forms begins anew. This monotony of landscape reminds one of the neighboring Great Russia. The only variety is afforded here by the details of landscape, which appear most numerous in this region of the Ukraine.

These are rain water-rifts (in Ukrainian balka, provallia, yaruha). In this, and often in other plateau and plain lands of the Ukraine, they become a terrible scourge. The heavy mantle of black soil, loess and loam favors the formation of water-rifts as well as the loose chalk and old tertiary strata (marl, sand, clay). The strenuous cutting down of forest in the past century has given the final impulse to the formation of such water clefts. In the loose soil, no longer held together by the forests, the water-rifts grow and spread after every heavy rain with terrible speed, and may, in a few years, reduce a wealthy farmer to the beggar's staff by transforming his most profitable black-soil fields into a maze of deep, dry ravines. Only a national re-stocking of the forests could bring the land relief. Especially in the neighborhood of the high precipitous banks of the rivers, the water-rifts work their mischief.

The glacial age had no particular significance for the surface configuration of the Dnieper Plain and the adjacent plateau spurs. Only in the north Chernihiv country we find real traces of the glacier. The large peninsulas which the southern limit of the glacial boulders forms along the course of the Dnieper and the Don are by no means to be regarded as traces of two great glacial tongues. The sand and loam masses, with enclosed glacial boulders, which are found in the region of these peninsulas, are of fluvio-glacial origin, and were deposited by melted ice from the glacier on its way to the Black Sea. The northern limit of the black soil region is not in the least affected by these problematic glacial peninsulas.

After the glacial period, however, movements of the earth took place in the entire Ukrainian plateau group. It rose considerably, and the erosive action of the rivers began. At the point where the axis of the Ukrainian horst cuts the Dnieper, we find this rise of ground also in the Dnieper Plateau. The rapids of the Dnieper were formed at that time, and, up to the present, the giant river has not succeeded in leveling its falls.

That tectonic disturbances are not unknown to the Dnieper Plain we learn from the occurrence of volcanic rock and displacement of the strata near Isachki, not far from the city of Lokhvitza, and on Mount Pivikha, north of Kreminchuk. It seems that along the northeast border of the Ukrainian horst a greatly disturbed area is hidden beneath more recent flat-piled rock layers. Great disturbances of the magnetic force of the earth seem to indicate the same.

The Dnieper Plain forms the last member in the northern plain district of the Ukraine. The southern plain district which extends along the northern banks of the Black Sea, from the delta of the Danube into the Kuban region, has since ancient times borne the accepted name of the Pontian Steppe-plain. Its old Ukrainian name is simply nis (lowland) or dike pole (wild field. The steppe-land and the river district, to this day, bear the famous name of Zaporozhe (land below the rapids).

The Pontian steppe-plain is bounded on the north by the spurs of the Bessarabian, Podolian, Dnieper and Donets Plateaus. On the south, by the sea-shore and the country at the foot of the Yaila Mountains, in Crimea. Past the Danube deltas the steppe-plain merges into the exactly similar steppe-plain on the Kuban.

The surface of the steppe-plain is exceptionally flat, slightly undulating only at the northern border, where the transition to the southern spurs of the Ukrainian plateau group proceeds imperceptibly. Innumerable barrows (mohyla) are as characteristic of the landscape of the Pontian Steppe-plain as the flat plate-shaped depressions of the ground, with small temporary lakes, the swampy flat valleys and the small salt marshes with their peculiar vegetation.

The many balkas, which divide the steppe-plain into innumerable low plateaus, do not affect the grand uniformity of the steppe landscape very much. As in the neighboring plateaus, they are cut in deep, but do not become visible to the traveler until he comes directly upon them. The Pliocene steppe-lime which predominates in the entire steppe-plain, covers the Sarmatian and Mediterranean strata, and reveals the crystalline substratum only in the west of the Dnieper in the neighborhood of the Dnieper Plateau, and forms rocky cornices on the slopes of the balkas. Lesser tectonic disturbances, in the shape of anticlines and synclines, have affected these youngest tertiary formations also. They are covered by a mantle of loess and black earth, which becomes constantly thinner toward the south. The typical chornozyom gives way, south of the parallel of Kherson, to the brown, also very fertile steppe-soil, which is accompanied in long stretches, however, by the saline earth. To the east of the Dnieper, at the southern spurs of the Donets Plateau, the crystalline substratum also appears to a great extent, in banks of rock, in the midst of the steppe-plain.

Only along the large streams of the steppe country does the nature of the land change. Their valleys are broad and swampy, covered by the so-called plavni. Interminable thickets of sedge and seeds, marsh forest and meadows, together with innumerable river branches, old river beds, and small lakes, make up a beautiful, fresh, verdant country in the midst of the boundless steppe, whose vernal dress, resplendent with blossoms, turns yellow and blackish-brown in summer and fall, from the fierce glow of the sun.