Chapter III: Preface (3)

The sinking of the land flooded the lower Columbia River and the mouth of the Willamette, so that ocean ships may now go up as far as Portland. The currents and waves soon threw up bars across the mouths of the smaller streams, and formed lagoons behind them. Ships frequently have difficulty in entering many of the harbors because of the sand bars which have been built up part way to the surface of the water.

It is thought that along some portions of the coast there has recently been a slight upward movement of the land. Figure 37 shows a bit of California coast, near San Juan, where the Santa Fé railroad has laid its tracks for several miles along a strip of abandoned beach, at the base of a cliff against which the waves once beat.

At the northern end of Vancouver island there is a deep arm of the ocean called Quatsino Sound. A limestone cliff upon the shore of this sound (Fig. 38) has been undermined by the dissolving of the limestone, but now the water lacks three feet of rising to the notch which it recently formed.

THE DISCOVERY OF THE COLUMBIA RIVER

The influence exerted by the various features of the land and water upon the settlement of a new region are not always fully appreciated. If the entrance to San Francisco Bay had been broader and more easily discerned by the early navigators who sailed past it, and if the mouth of the Columbia River had not been obscured by lowlands and a line of breakers upon the bar, the history of western America would probably have been very different.

In the seventeenth century the prospect seemed to be that Spain would control the Pacific Ocean. She claimed, by right of discovery, all the lands bordering upon this ocean and the exclusive right to navigate its waters. Every vessel found there without license from the court of Spain was, by royal decree, to be confiscated.

It is interesting, after all these years and with our present knowledge, to look back and see how unreasonable were the claims of Spain. In the fifteenth century the extent of the Pacific ocean was not known. In fact, men's ideas as to the distribution of land and water over the earth were so indefinite that it was at first supposed that the islands which Columbus discovered belonged to the East Indies.

The claims of Spain to the Pacific Ocean were based upon its discovery by Balboa, but she never made any serious efforts to enforce them, for the attempt would have involved her in war with all the maritime nations of Europe. Spain lacked the ability to take advantage of the great discoveries which her navigators and explorers had made, and for that reason she merely looked on, though with jealous eyes, when in the eighteenth century the ships of England, France, Holland, and Russia entered the Pacific Ocean with a view to exploration and conquest.

Determined at last to support their claim to the Pacific coast of North America, the Spaniards began to realize the necessity of exploring it more fully and of founding settlements. It was their plan to take possession of the whole region between Mexico upon the south and the Russian trading posts along the shores of Alaska. As exploration by land was impossible because of mountain ranges and deserts, the Spanish adventurers were forced to rely upon the ocean, with all its uncertainties of storm and contrary winds.

Between 1774 and 1779 voyages were made as far north as Queen Charlotte's Island, in latitude 54°. A station was established and held for many years at Nootka Sound, upon the west coast of Vancouver Island. The first expedition passed the Strait of Juan de Fuca apparently without seeing it, although there was a rumor to the effect that a broad opening into the land had been discovered by a certain Juan de Fuca in 1592, while he was exploring in the employ of Spain. The latitude of this opening, as he gave it, nearly corresponds to that of the strait which now bears his name.

For many years the attempt to discover a passage around the northern part of America engaged the early navigators upon both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. Their desire to find an easy route to India spurred them to constant effort. For a time it was believed that such an opening actually existed, and mariners went so far as to give it a name, calling it the Straits of Anian. The reputed discoveries of Juan de Fuca materially strengthened the general belief in a passage to the northward of America.

Vizcaino, in his voyage of 1603, reached latitude 43° north and thought that he had discovered a great river flowing into the Pacific Ocean. This opening, although south of the point supposed to have been reached by Juan de Fuca, was believed for a time to be the entrance to the long-sought Straits of Anian. During the latter part of the seventeenth century California was represented upon the Spanish maps as an island having Cape Blanco, which Vizcaino discovered and named, as its northern point, and separated from the mainland by an extension of the Gulf of California northward.

To return now to the Spanish explorations, in the latter part of the seventeenth century we find that Heceta, following the first expedition, succeeded in getting as far as Vancouver Island, where, having been parted from an accompanying ship by a storm, he turned southward, passing the Strait of Juan de Fuca and keeping close by the shore. In latitude 46° 17' he found an opening in the coast from which a strong current issued. He felt sure that he had discovered the mouth of some large river. Upon the later Spanish maps this was called Heceta's Inlet, or River of San Roque. A glance at the map will show how closely the latitude given corresponds to the mouth of the river which was discovered later by Captain Gray and named, after his ship, the Columbia.

A short time before Heceta's discovery, Captain Jonathan Carver of Connecticut set out on an exploring tour, partly for the purpose of determining the width of the continent and the nature of the Indian inhabitants. He mentions four great rivers rising within a few leagues of one another, "The river Bourbon (Red River of the North) which empties itself into Hudson's Bay, the waters of the St. Lawrence, the Mississippi, and the river Oregon, or River of the West, that falls into the Pacific Ocean at the Straits of Anian." Carver's descriptions are fanciful, and it is not likely that he ever saw the river which is now known as the Columbia, although there is a possibility that he heard stories from the Indians of a great river upon the western slope of the Rocky Mountains, and invented for it the name Oregon.

In 1787 Meares, an English trader, visited the coast, and sailing southward from the Strait of Juan de Fuca, attempted to find the river San Roque as it was laid down upon the Spanish charts. Reaching the proper latitude, Meares rounded a promontory and found behind it a bay which he was unable to enter because of a continuous line of breakers extending across it. He became satisfied that there was no such river as the San Roque, and named the promontory Cape Disappointment and the bay Deception Bay. If Meares had entered the bay through the breakers, the English would undoubtedly have made good their claim to the discovery of the Columbia River.

After the Revolution, American trading ships began to extend their operations into the North Pacific. In 1787 two such vessels left Boston, one of them under command of a Captain Gray. After reaching the Pacific, the ships were parted during a storm, and Captain Gray finally touched the American coast near the forty-sixth degree of north latitude. For nine days he tried to enter an opening which was in all probability the one attempted by Meares. After nearly losing his ship and suffering an Indian attack, he sailed north to Nootka Sound.

Captain Gray returned to Boston, but in 1790 started upon another trading expedition in command of the ship _Columbia_. Arriving safely in the North Pacific, he spent the winter of 1791-1792 upon Vancouver Island.

Vancouver, whose name has been given to the largest island upon the western coast of North America, and who did so much to make known the intricate coast line of the Puget Sound region, arrived upon the scene in 1792. He was authorized to carry on explorations, and to treat with Spain concerning the abandonment of the Spanish claim to Nootka Sound.

Vancouver sailed up the coast, keeping a close lookout for the river San Roque. No opening in the land appeared, although at one spot he sailed through a muddy-colored sea which he judged was affected by the water of some river. Upon reaching the Strait of Fuca, Vancouver expressed the opinion that there was no river between the fortieth and forty-eighth degrees of north latitude, "only brooks insufficient for our vessels to navigate."

Shortly after this time, Vancouver met Captain Gray with his ship _Columbia_. The disheartened explorer placed no confidence in Captain Gray's report that, upon his former voyage, he had discovered a large river to the south. Vancouver in his narrative says, "I was thoroughly convinced that we could not possibly have passed any safe navigable opening, harbor, or place of security for shipping on this coast from Cape Mendocino to the promontory of Closset" (Cape Flattery).

Captain Gray, however, determined to make further investigations. He sailed southward and entered a port now known as Gray's Harbor, where he spent several days trading with the Indians. From this harbor he ran on south for a few miles past Cape Disappointment, and then sailed through an opening in the breakers into a bay which he supposed formed the mouth of the river of which he was in search. He finally anchored, as he says, "in a large river of fresh water."

Showing sawmills and log booms]

Later Captain Gray took the vessel twelve or fifteen miles up the river, and would have gone farther if he had not wandered into the wrong channel. When he left the river he named it the Columbia in honor of his vessel. Thus by the right of actual discovery the United States was at last able to make good its claim to the river.

The English claimed that Gray did not enter the river itself, as the tide sets up many miles farther than the point which his ship reached. They insisted that what he saw was simply a bay. But the truth is that Gray was actually in the mouth of the river. The mere fact that the tide enters the lower portion of the river makes no difference. The actual mouth of the Columbia is marked by the north and south coast line. The entrance of the tide water, and the backing of the current for many miles up stream, is the result of a recent sinking of the land. The same features are presented by the Hudson River.

If the English had discovered and entered the river first it is probable that this stream would have become the boundary line between the United States and British Columbia, in which case the whole northern portion of the Oregon territory would have been lost to us. As it was, the English laid insistent claim to the northern bank of the river and established trading posts at various points. The lowest of these posts stood upon the site of Fort Vancouver, a little above the mouth of the Willamette River.

The famous exploring expedition under Captains Lewis and Clark wintered at the mouth of the Columbia in 1804-1805, in a group of rude log cabins known as Fort Clatsop. The first settlement in the vicinity was made in 1811, when a fur company organized by John Jacob Astor attempted to establish a trading post upon the Columbia. Two parties were sent out from New York. One travelled by water around Cape Horn, while the other, with great difficulty, crossed the continent by the way of the Missouri, Snake, and Columbia rivers. The undertaking proved unsuccessful, for after the War of 1812 began supplies could no longer be sent safely to the post.

The Astor company finally surrendered its establishment to an English company, and in this way the control of the river was transferred to England. With the return of peace the post was restored to the United States, and its location is marked now by the city of Astoria.

Near the mouth of the Columbia River]

What small things sometimes determine the trend of great events! A little more care and energy on the part of Vancouver or Meares would have placed the Columbia River in the hands of the English. The existence of an open river mouth without any breaking bar would have brought about the same result.

The Spaniards came first to the Pacific slope, claiming the whole coast as far north as the Russian possessions. Later the United States, by treaty with Spain and Russia, acquired a right to all that portion of the Pacific coast of North America which lies between California and the Russian possessions. But because of the greater energy of the English, and the failure upon the part of the United States to realize the value of this vast region, a considerable section was again lost by the terms of the treaty which made the forty-ninth parallel the boundary line. The intelligence and energy of Captain Gray alone preserved to us the rich lands of Washington.

At the mouth of the Columbia River]

THE GREAT BASIN AND ITS PECULIAR LAKES

As our country was slowly being explored and settled, one region was brought to light which Nature seemed to have left unfinished and in a desolate condition. This barren stretch of country was once marked upon the maps as the Great American Desert, and included a large part of the extensive region lying between the Rocky Mountains upon the east and the Sierra Nevada Mountains upon the west. To the south lay the Grand Cañon of the Colorado, while upon the north the boundary was formed by the cañons of the Snake and Columbia rivers.

After a time it was found that this region, covering about two hundred and twenty-five thousand square miles, not only was extremely dry, but had no outlet to the ocean. A rim of higher land all about made of it so perfect a basin that it became known as the Great Basin. None of the water that falls upon the surface of this basin ever reaches the ocean through surface streams. Some of it soaks into the rocks, but the greater part is evaporated into the dry air.

We have already learned something about the way in which the ridges and hollows of the earth's surface are made. We have learned of the wrinkling of the crust, of the formation of fissures, and of the erosive work of running water. The interesting features of the Great Basin are mainly the result of two causes: the sinking of a portion of the earth's surface, and the lack of rainfall.

Long ago the Wasatch Range of eastern Utah and the Sierra Nevadas of California formed parts of a vast elevated plateau. Then there came a time when the forces holding up the plateau were relaxed, and as the weight of the plateau pressed it down, the solid rocks broke into huge fragments. Some of the blocks thus made sank and formed valleys; others were tilted or pushed up and formed mountains. Thus the north and south mountain ranges and valleys of the Great Basin were born.

We must understand, then, that the Great Basin is not a simple depression with higher land all about. The breaking up of the surface produced many basins, large and small. Some of these basins are six thousand feet above the level of the sea, others are much lower, and one has been dropped below the level of the sea, so that if it were not for barriers the water would flow in. Some of the basins are rimmed all about by steep mountains, others are so broad and flat that it is difficult to tell that they really are basins. Many of the valleys are so connected with one another that if a heavy rainfall should ever occur drainage systems would be quickly established.

The Great Basin now appears like the skeleton of a dried-up world; but if the climate should change and become like that of the Mississippi Valley, the surface of the desert would undergo a wondrous transformation. The hundreds of basins, if fed by streams from the surrounding mountains, would then become lakes. The highest, overflowing, would empty into a lower, and this in turn into a still lower basin, until the water had accumulated in vast inland seas. These seas, overflowing the rim of the Great Basin at its lowest points, would send rivers hastening away to the ocean.

What a region of lakes this would be for a time! Then they would begin to disappear, for lakes are short-lived as compared with mountains. Some would be filled with clay and gravel brought by the streams. Others would be drained by a cutting down of their outlets.

Great Salt Lake, which is the only body of water in the Basin that has ever sent a stream to the ocean, was lowered four hundred feet by the washing away of the rock and earth at its outlet.

We know that the rainfall never has been heavy in this region since the Great Basin was formed, although at one time it was sufficiently great to form two inland seas, one in northwestern Nevada, the other in Utah.

The chief reason for the dryness of the Great Basin is the presence of that lofty barrier, the Sierra Nevada mountain range, between the Basin and the Pacific Ocean. The storms, which usually come from the ocean, are intercepted by this range, and the greater portion of their moisture is taken away. The little moisture that remains falls upon the highlands of the Great Basin, and so relieves its surface from utter barrenness. The adjacent slopes of the Sierra Nevada and Wasatch ranges furnish numerous perennial streams which feed the lakes about the borders of the Basin, such as Great Salt Lake, Pyramid, Walker, Mono, Honey, and Owens lakes. The wet weather streams, flowing down the desert mountains for a short time each year, frequently form broad, shallow lakes which disappear with the coming of the summer sun.

The climate of the Great Basin has changed from time to time. During one period it was much drier than it is now, and the lakes were nearly or quite dried up. It must have been a desolate region then, shunned by animals and forbidden to man.

During the Glacial period, a few thousand years ago, the climate was moister and cooler than it is now. The mountains were covered with deep snows, and glaciers crept down the slopes of the higher peaks. Great Salt Lake covered all northwestern Utah; to this former body of water the name Bonneville has been given, in honor of a noted trapper. Pyramid, Winnemucca, Carson, Walker, and Honey lakes, now separated from one another by sagebrush deserts, were then united in one great lake, to which the name Lahontan has been given, in honor of an early French explorer.

Lake Lahontan covered a large portion of northwestern Nevada and penetrated into California. It was broken into long winding arms and bays by various mountain ranges. The deepest portion of this ancient lake is now occupied by Pyramid Lake, which is, perhaps, the most picturesque of all the Basin lakes. Fish can live in the waters of this lake, although nearly all the others are so salty or so alkaline that they support none of the ordinary forms of life.

Bed of old Lake Lahontan]

Upon the Black Rock Desert, in northern Nevada, there are large springs once covered by Lake Lahontan, in which fish are found. It is thought that the ancestors of these fish must have been left there at the time of the drying up of the water.

After the Glacial period the present arid climate began to prevail in the land. Hundreds of the shallow lakes which had been scattered over this extensive region disappeared. Others contained water for only a portion of each year. A body of water which is not permanent, but comes and goes with the seasons, we call a playa lake. Many of these playa lakes present in summer a hard, yellow-clay floor of many miles in extent and entirely free from vegetation. The beds of others are covered with a whitish crust, formed of the various salts which were in solution in the lake water.

A playa lake]

An important feature of the lakes of the Great Basin is the presence of large quantities of such substances as common salt, soda, borax, and nitre. The ocean is salt because it has no outlet, while the rivers of the globe are continually bringing into it various minerals, dissolved from the rocks over which they flow. Lakes with outlets are not salty, because with a continuous change of the water there is no opportunity for the minerals to accumulate, although they are always present in small quantities. Any lake which does not receive enough running water to cause it to overflow the borders of its basin, will in course of time become rich in various kinds of salt.

No two of the lakes of the Great Basin are alike in the composition of their waters. This fact may be due to a difference in the rocks about the lake basin, to the presence of varying mineral springs, or to the drying up of one or more of the lakes at some time so that their former salts were buried under sands and clays when the water again filled the basin.

Great Salt Lake contains little besides common salt. In Mono Lake, soda and salt are equally important constituents, while Owens Lake contains an excess of soda. In other basins borax was present in such quantities that when the waters dried up it formed important deposits. The value of these deposits is now fully understood, and many enterprising companies are at work separating and purifying the borax.

Owens Lake was once fresh, although now it is so strong with soda that it would destroy the skin if a bather should remain in it very long. The former outlet of this lake was toward the south, through a pass separating the Sierra Nevada from the Coso Mountains. For a distance of thirty miles the old river-bed has been transformed into a wagon road, and it is interesting to ride all day along the bed of this dead river, past bold cliffs against which the waters once surged and foamed. The river emptied far to the south, into a broad, shallow lake whose former bed is now white with soda and borax. The old beach lines stand out distinctly upon the slopes of the enclosing mountains.

The lake bed is now the seat of an important industry--the gathering of the borax and its refining. There are extensive buildings at one spot upon its border, and men come and go across the blinding white surface. A twenty-mule team dragging three huge wagons creeps slowly along the base of the distant mountains, but all that can be distinguished is a cloud of dust.

The slow crumbling of the rocks, and the setting free of those constituents which are soluble, the work of the streams in gathering the rock waste into the lakes, the dry air and the heat of the long summer days, have all conspired together to give us these valuable deposits in the dried-up lakes of the Great Basin.

No portion of the earth seems to be without value to man. The great bodies of water are convenient highways. The rich valleys and timbered mountains offer useful products. Even the deserts, where living things of every description find the struggle for existence very hard, become indispensable. If the climate in the Great Basin had been moist, the salts would not have been preserved, but would have been carried away to the ocean, from which only common salt could have been recovered in commercial quantities.

Formed of calcareous tufa]

The crossing of the Great Basin was dreaded by the early emigrants on their way to the Pacific coast. In many cases the locations of the few springs and water-courses were unknown, and the journey over the vast barren stretches was fraught with danger.

Stand upon a mountain in the desert some clear day in summer and you will see range after range, with intervening sandy wastes, stretching away to the horizon. The air below is tremulous with heat, and every living thing that can move has sought the shade of some rock or cliff. The plants seem almost dead, for the little springs, hidden at rare intervals in the deep cañons, are of no use to them.

What transformations would be wrought upon these desert slopes if it were possible for the soil to receive and retain large quantities of water! Forest-covered mountains, green hillsides, rippling streams, lakes, farms, orchards, and towns would appear as if by magic.

FRÉMONT'S ADVENTURES IN THE GREAT BASIN

Frémont, "the Pathfinder," did greater service than any other man in making known the geographic features of the Cordilleran region. In the fifth decade of the last century, while California still belonged to Mexico and the pioneers were turning their attention to the Oregon country, Frémont organized and conducted three exploring expeditions under the direction of the government. When in California upon the third expedition he took part in the skirmishes which resulted in the transference of this section to the United States.

A fourth expedition, undertaken by Frémont on his own account, resulted disastrously. The explorers foolishly tried to cross the Rocky Mountains in the middle of winter, but had to give up the attempt after many of the party had died from cold and starvation.

It is hard for us to realize, now, that only sixty years ago the territory lying between the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific coast was practically unknown. Try to imagine the feelings of emigrants, bound for the gold-fields of California, who have pushed into the Great Basin without knowing where to look for grass or water. They are camped by a spring of alkaline water scarcely fit to drink; their weary animals nibble at the scanty grass about the spring; far ahead stretches the pathless desert which they must cross; upon their choice of a route their very lives will depend.

Now it is all changed. The whole region is crossed and recrossed by wagon roads and railways. Many mining towns are scattered through the mountains which dot the seemingly boundless expanse of desert, while in every place where water can be found there are gardens, green fields of alfalfa, and herds of cattle.

Before the year 1840 some knowledge had been acquired of the borders of the Great Basin. Trappers and explorers had crossed the Rocky Mountains and had gone down the Columbia River. There were Spanish settlements in New Mexico, Arizona, and along the coast of California.

Frémont's first expedition had taken him to the summit of the Rocky Mountains in northwestern Wyoming. In 1843 he started upon the second expedition. He was at that time commissioned to cross the Rockies, descend the Columbia to Fort Vancouver, and return by a route farther to the south, across the unknown region between the Columbia and the Colorado rivers.

Let us follow the little band of explorers led by Captain Frémont as day after day they made their way across what was then a trackless waste, and see what troubles they encountered because of the inaccuracy of the maps of that period.

Leaving Fort Vancouver, upon the lower Columbia, for the return trip, the party ascended the river to The Dalles and then turned southward along the eastern side of the Cascade Range. They soon entered upon a region never before traversed by white men. At the time when autumn was giving place to winter, without reliable guides or maps, they were to cross the deserts lying between them and the Rocky Mountains.

Showing the Buenaventura River]

They met with no great difficulties until they had gone as far south as Klamath Lake. "From this point," Frémont says, "our course was intended to be about southeast to a reported lake called Mary's, at some days' journey in the Great Basin, and thence, still on southeast to the reputed Buenaventura (good chance) River, which has had a place on so many maps, and countenanced the belief in the existence of a great river flowing from the Rocky Mountains to the Bay of San Francisco."

Figure 47 shows one of the maps to which Frémont refers. How interesting it is! Compare it with a good map in your geography and you will readily see that it is very misleading. The Sierra Nevada, one of the greatest mountain ranges in the United States, hardly appears, while traced directly across the map is the great Buenaventura River which Frémont expected to find and follow eastward toward its source near the Rocky Mountains.

If this river had really been where it was mapped, it is likely that Frémont would have had no trouble, for if hard pressed he could have followed the stream down to the ocean. But a wall of snow-covered mountains lying in the way made matters very different.

Winter was coming on when the party entered what is now northwestern Nevada, looking for the Buenaventura River. For several weeks they toiled on, often through the snow. Concerning this part of the journey Frémont says: "We had reached and run over the position where, according to the best maps in my possession, we should have found Mary's lake or river. We were evidently on the verge of the desert, and the country was so forbidding that we were afraid to enter it."

The party then turned south, still hoping that the river might be discovered. After a time they came upon a large lake and travelled for many miles along its eastern shore. One camp was made opposite a tall, pyramid-shaped island, the white surface of which made it conspicuous for a long distance. Frémont was much impressed by the resemblance of the island to the pyramids of Egypt and so named the body of water Pyramid Lake. At the southern end of the lake the travellers found a large stream flowing into it (now known as the Truckee River), and followed along its banks for some distance; but as the river turned toward the west, they left it and struck out across the country.

Frémont says again, "With every stream I now expected to see the great Buenaventura, and Carson (Kit Carson, the famous scout) hurried eagerly to search on every one we reached for beaver cuttings, which he always maintained we should find only on waters which ran to the Pacific."

But all the streams flowed in the wrong direction, until at last the explorers grew weary of hunting for the river which had no existence. Although it was the middle of the winter, Frémont determined to cross the lofty Sierras which rose like a white wall to the west. Once over the mountains, he hoped to gain the American settlements in the Sacramento Valley, where already Sutter's Fort had been established.

The party ascended Walker River, dragging, with great difficulty, a howitzer which they had brought with them. The snows grew deeper as storm succeeded storm. Feeling that they were really lost, the disheartened men at length abandoned the gun, at a spot which has since been named Lost Cañon.

When their own provisions were nearly gone, the party obtained some pine nuts and also several rabbits from the Indians. A dog which had been brought along made one good meal for the wayfarers. An Indian who had been persuaded to act as guide pointed out the spot where two white men, one of whom was Walker, a noted frontiersman, had once crossed the mountains; but the guide made them understand that it was impossible to cross at that time of the year, saying, in his own language, "Rock upon rock, snow upon snow."

Although they could advance only by breaking paths through the snow, and were reduced to eating mule and horse flesh, yet the Frémont party pushed on. Finally they reached the summit of the mountains and turned down by the head of a stream flowing westward, which proved to be the American River. After three weeks more of terrible suffering they came out of the mountains at Sutter's Fort, where they obtained supplies and had an opportunity to rest and recruit.

Frémont now recognized the incorrectness of the maps which had so nearly caused the destruction of the party. As he says in his notes: "No river from the interior does, or can, cross the Sierra Nevada, itself more lofty than the Rocky Mountains... There is no opening from the Bay of San Francisco into the interior of the continent."

When the return journey was begun the party did not recross the high Sierras, but turned southward through the San Joaquin Valley and gained the Mohave Desert by the way of Tehachapai pass. The route now led eastward across the deserts and low mountain ranges of California and southern Nevada, until at last Great Salt Lake was reached.

Among the many geographical discoveries of the expedition was the demonstration of the existence of the Great Basin. In his report, Frémont, while speaking of its vast sterile valleys and of the Indians which inhabit them, says: "That it is peopled we know, but miserably and sparsely ... dispersed in single families ... eating seeds and insects, digging roots (hence their name) [Digger Indians], such is the condition of the greater part. Others are a degree higher and live in communities upon some lake or river from which they repulse the miserable Diggers.

"The rabbit is the largest animal known in this desert, its flesh affords a little meat.... The wild sage is their only wood, and here it is of extraordinary size--sometimes a foot in diameter and six or eight feet high. It serves for fuel, for building material, for shelter for the rabbits, and for some sort of covering for the feet and legs in cold weather. But I flatter myself that what is discovered, though not enough to satisfy curiosity, is sufficient to excite it, and that subsequent explorations will complete what has been commenced."

THE STORY OF GREAT SALT LAKE

The most interesting geographical feature of Utah is the Great Salt Lake. Few tourists now cross the continent without visiting the lake and taking a bath in its briny waters. This strange body of water has, however, been slowly growing smaller for some years, and probably will in time disappear. A study of the history of the lake may throw some light upon the important question of its possible disappearance, and it will certainly bring out many interesting facts.

We do not know with certainty who was the first white man to look upon this inland sea, although it is supposed to have been James Bridger, a noted trapper, who in 1825 followed Bear River down to its mouth. He tasted the water and found it salt, a fact which encouraged him in the belief that he had found an arm of the Pacific Ocean.

More than two hundred years ago there were vague ideas about a salt lake situated somewhere beyond the Rocky Mountains. In 1689 Baron Lahontan published an account of his travels from Mackinac to the Mississippi River and the region beyond. He states that he ascended a westerly branch of the river for six weeks, until the season became too late for farther progress. He reports meeting savages who said that one hundred and fifty leagues beyond there was a salt lake, "three hundred leagues in circumference--its mouth stretching a great way to the southward."

This imaginative story aroused interest in the West. In a book published in 1772, devoted to a description of the province La Louisiane, the possibility of water communication with the South Sea is discussed as follows: "It will be of great convenience to this country, if ever it becomes settled, that there is an easy communication therewith, and the South Sea, which lies between America and China, and that two ways: by the north branch of the great Yellow River, by the natives called the river of the 'Massorites' (Missouri), which hath a course of five hundred miles, navigable to its head, or springs, and which proceeds from a ridge of hills somewhat north of New Mexico, passable by horse, foot, or wagon, in less than half a day. On the other side are rivers which run into a great lake that empties itself by another navigable river into the South Sea. The same may be said of the Meschaouay, up which our people have been, but not so far as the Baron Lahontan, who passed on it above three hundred miles almost due west, and declares it comes from the same ridge of hills above mentioned, and that divers rivers from the other side soon make a large river, which enters into a vast lake, on which inhabit two or three great nations, much more populous and civilized than other Indians; and out of that lake a great river disembogues into the South Sea."

In 1776 Father Escalante travelled from Santa Fé far to the north and west. He met Indians who told him of a lake the waters of which produced a burning sensation when placed upon the skin. This was probably Great Salt Lake, but it is not thought that he himself ever saw it. The Escalante Desert, in southern Utah, once covered by the waters of the lake, is named after this explorer.

Nothing more seems to have been learned of the lake after its discovery by Bridger until in 1833 Bonneville, a daring leader among the trappers, organized a party for its exploration. Washington Irving, in his history of Captain Bonneville, says of the party, "A desert surrounded them and stretched to the southwest as far as the eye could reach, rivalling the deserts of Asia and Africa in sterility. There was neither tree, nor herbage, nor spring, nor pool, nor running stream, nothing but parched wastes of sand, where horse and rider were in danger of perishing."

Although decreasing in area so rapidly, Great Salt Lake is still the largest body of water in the western part of the United States, and the largest salt lake within its boundaries. It has a length of seventy miles and a maximum width of nearly fifty miles.

Desolate, indeed, must have appeared the surroundings of the lake, with its salt-incrusted borders, as the Mormon emigrants gained the summit of the Wasatch Range and looked out over the vast expanse to the west. But as the slopes at the foot of the mountains seemed capable of producing food for their support, they stopped and made their homes there. Now in this same region, after half a century, one can ride for many miles through as beautiful and highly cultivated a country as the sun ever looked down upon. In the early days the barren plains were broken only by mountains almost as barren, which rose from them like the islands from the surface of the Great Salt Lake. The only pleasing prospect was toward the east, where stood the steep and rugged Wasatch Range, with its snow-capped peaks. From its deep cañons issued large streams of pure, cold water, which flowed undisturbed across the brush-covered slopes, then unbroken by irrigating ditches, and at last were lost in the salt lake.

One might think that streams of water apparently so pure would at last freshen the lake, but in reality they are carrying along invisible particles of mineral matter which add to its saltness day by day. The dry air steals away the water from the lake as fast as it runs in, but cannot take the minerals which it holds in solution.

Great Salt Lake is still considered very large, but at one time it was ten times its present size, while still longer ago there was no lake at all. Without a basin there can be no lake, and at that far-away time, as we have already learned, the Great Basin did not exist, and the streams, if there were any, ran away to the ocean without hindrance.

When the Great Basin was formed by a breaking and bending of the crust of the earth, many a stream lost its connection with the ocean and went to work filling up the smaller basins, thus giving rise to the lakes which have already been described. The largest of these bodies of water, and in some respects the most interesting, is Great Salt Lake.

Foot of the Wasatch Range]

This lake, lying close to the lofty Wasatch Range, received so much water from numerous streams during the Glacial period that it slowly spread over thousands of square miles, overrunning the desert valleys and making islands of the scattered mountain ranges. It extended from north to south across Utah, into southern Idaho and almost to the Arizona line, until this body of water, which arose from so small beginnings, had become a veritable inland sea, three hundred miles long, one hundred miles wide, and one thousand feet deep.

By the time the lake had covered an area of twenty thousand square miles the lowest point in the rim of the basin was reached and the overflow began. No map will tell you where the outlet was, for no river exists there now. If you could explore the shore lines of this ancient lake, which has been called Bonneville after the noted trapper, you would find two low spots in the mountains which hem the waters in, one upon the south, facing the Colorado River, the other on the north toward the Snake River. The one on the north happened to be a little lower, so that the break occurred there. First as a little, trickling stream, then as a mighty, surging river, the water poured northward down the valley of a small stream, widening and deepening it until, passing the spot where now the town of Pocatello stands, it joined the Snake River.

This old outlet is now known as Red Rock Pass, and it forms an easy route for the Oregon Short Line from Salt Lake City to the plains of southern Idaho. The old river-bed is marked by marshes and fertile farms.

With an outlet established, Lake Bonneville could rise no higher, and its waves began the formation of a well-defined terrace or beach, just as waves are sure to do along every shore. The level of the water could not remain permanently at the same height, for the rocks at the outlet were being worn away by the large volume of water which flowed over them. In the course of years the level of the lake was lowered four hundred feet. The sinking was not uniform, but took place by stages, while at each period of rest the waves made a new beach line. The lake during all this time must have been a beautiful sheet of fresh water filled with fish. Its shores, also, must have been much richer in vegetation than they are now.

Outlet of Lake Bonneville]

The water remained for a long time at the level of four hundred feet below its highest stage. This fact is evident from the width of the wave-cut terrace, which is the most prominent of all those that mark the old levels along the sides of the mountains. Finally, for some reason the climate began to change, the streams supplied less water to the lake, and the evaporation from its surface became greater because the air was drier. As a result the lake was lowered to such an extent that it lost its outlet. The mighty river flowing down through Red Rock Cañon grew smaller and at last dried up altogether.

In this manner the lake was again cut off from the ocean, as it had been during its earlier history. The waters still continued to recede, but not at a uniform rate. During periods of greater rain its level remained stationary, so that the waves added new terraces to those already formed.

As the lake had no outlet and was decreasing in volume, the water became salty, for the minerals brought by the streams could no longer be carried away. The fish either died or passed up into the purer waters of the inflowing streams.

The water of the present lake is so salt that in every four quarts there is one quart of salt, and the preparation of this commodity by a process of evaporating the water in ponds has become an important industry. The water is the strongest kind of brine and it is impossible for a bather to sink in it. One floats about upon it almost as lightly as wood does upon ordinary water. After bathing it is necessary to wash in fresh water to remove the salt from the body.

The dry bed of the former Lake Bonneville stretches far to the south and west of the present lake, and forms one of the most barren and arid regions in the United States. It is sometimes called the Great American Desert.

Why is the lake receding now? Some people think that the climate is growing still more arid, and that the lake will eventually disappear. Others think that its shrinkage is the result of irrigation, for a large part of the water from the streams which supply it is now taken out and turned upon the land. There is still another reason which may account for the low water. The lake is known to rise and fall during a series of wet and dry years. When first mapped, in the middle of the last century, it was about as low as it is now. Then it gradually rose for a number of years and lately has again been falling.

The story of Great Salt Lake has been much more complicated than the statement given above, but this is sufficient for our purpose.

Irrigation has made a garden spot of a large part of the old bed of Lake Bonneville, but much of the beauty and attractiveness of this region would be lost if the present lake should give place to a bed of glistening salt. Let us hope that it will remain as it is.

THE SKAGIT RIVER

The Skagit is not one of the great rivers of the world, for very little of its course lies outside the boundaries of a single state. It is, however, none the less interesting. Few rivers with a length of only one hundred and fifty miles present so great a variety of instructive features. We shall certainly learn more from a study of the Skagit than from many a better known and more pretentious river.

Innumerable torrents, fed by the glaciers of the Cascade Range, pour down the rocky slopes and lose themselves in the wooded cañons below. The cañon streams, of much greater size, flow less impetuously over gentler slopes, and are frequently blocked by boulders and logs. These streams unite in one broad, deep river, which moves on quietly to its resting-place in Puget Sound. Its name, Skagit, is of Indian origin and means _wild cat_.

By following the Skagit River and a tributary stream, one can go from the bare and snowy summit of the Cascade Range down through dense forests, and come out at last upon a magnificent delta, where a fertile plain is slowly but steadily encroaching upon the waters of the sound. What contrasting scenes are presented along the few short miles of the course of the river! A trip from its source to its mouth will be worth all the trouble it involves, although the trail is often disagreeably wet and sometimes dangerous.

There is no grander scenery in the United States than that of the Cascade Range; nor are there more dense forests than those found upon its western slope. The range is hidden in almost perpetual clouds and storms, and they are fortunate who can reach its summit upon a pleasant day.

The forests of fir and hemlock have gained a foothold nearly to the summit of the range. Upon the little benches and in the protected nooks the trees grow thriftily, and dense groves are found up to an elevation of nearly five thousand feet; but upon the more exposed and rocky slopes stunted trunks show the effect of a constant struggle with the rocks and winds. Upon other slopes, too high for the trees to grow, there are low shrubs and arctic mosses; but above all rise precipitous crags and peaks, utterly bare except for the glaciers nestling among them.

Under the shade of the upland forests the moss is damp and the wood wet, so that it is difficult to make a comfortable camp or to build a fire. But these discomforts are not worthy of consideration in view of the inspiration which one gains by the outlook from some commanding point upon the summit of the mountain range.

All about are jagged, splintered peaks. Upon every gentle slope there rests, within some alcove, a glistening mass of snow and ice. A score of these glaciers are in sight. They are supplied in winter by the drifting snows, and yield in summer, from their lower extremities, streams of ice-cold water. A multitude of streams raise a gentle murmur, broken occasionally by a dull roar as some glacier, in its slow descent, breaks upon the edge of a precipice and its fragments fall into the cañon below.

From a position upon the summit above the point where the Skagit trail crosses the mountains may be seen a little lake, on the surface of which remains some of last winter's ice not yet melted by the August sun. If the climate were a little colder, the basin would be occupied by a glacier instead of a lake. All about the lake there are steep, rocky slopes, more or less completely covered with low arctic plants and stunted, storm-beaten hemlocks. From among the trees at the foot of the lake rises the roof of a miner's log cabin, and a few hundred feet beyond a small, dark opening in the face of a cliff shows where the miner is running a tunnel in his search for gold.

Far below, and heading close under the sharp crest of the range, are densely wooded cañons. The fair weather is passing, and it is necessary to find the trail and descend. Clouds are sweeping across the ridges and peaks, and soon the whole summit will be covered by them.

From a point a little east of the summit the clouds present a grand sight at the gathering of a storm. Higher and higher they pile upon the ocean face of the mountains. At the bottom they are dark and threatening, but the thunder-heads above can be seen bathed in the bright sunlight. For a time the clouds hang upon the summit as if stopped by some invisible barrier; perhaps they are loath to pass into the drier air of the eastern slope. But finally they move on, and rain or snow soon envelops the whole landscape.

The trail descends rapidly for four thousand feet to Cascade River, a tributary of the Skagit. It is a steep and slippery way, and in many places it is not safe to ride the horses. The sub-arctic climate of the summit is left behind, and one is soon surrounded by dense and luxuriant vegetation. Such a change as this, in a short distance, shows how greatly elevation affects climate and plant growth.

Upon every hand there is the sound of rushing water. From the cliffs ribbon-like cascades are falling. The rivulets unite in one stream, which roars and tumbles down the cañon over logs and boulders. The trail crosses and recrosses the torrent until the water becomes too deep for fording, and then it leads one to a rude bridge made of two logs with split planks laid across them.

As the cañon widens, the trail leads farther from the river and through dense forests. The woods are so silent that they become oppressive, and the air is damp, for the sunlight is almost excluded. The tall trees, fir, hemlock, and spruce, with now and then a cedar, stand close together. Shrubs of many kinds are crowded among them, while mosses and ferns cover the ground. The fallen trunks are wrapped in moss, and young trees are growing upon them, drawing their nourishment from the decaying tissues. In the more open spots grow the salal bushes with their purple berries, the yellow salmon berries, and the blue-black huckleberries.