388 THE POPULAR SCIEXCE MONTHLY. 



channel, and these narrow canons are so close to each other as to be 

 separated by walls of rock so steep, in most places, that they cannot 

 be scaled, and many of these little caiioos are so broken by falls as to 

 be impassable in either direction. 



The whole country is cut, in this way, into irregular, angular 

 blocks, standing as buttresses, benches, and towers, about deep water- 

 ways and gloomy alcoves. 



The conditions under which the caiions have been carved will be 

 more elaborately discussed hereafter. 



To the west of Green River, and back some miles, between Black's 

 Fork and Henry's Fork, we have a region of buff, chocolate, and lead- 

 colored Bad Lands. This Bad-Land country differs from the Alcove 

 Land, above mentioned, in that its outlines are everywhere beautifully 

 rounded, as the rocks of which it is composed crumble quickly under 

 atmospheric agencies, so that an exposure of solid rock is rarely seen ; 

 but we have the same abrupt descent of the streams, and the same 

 elaborate system of water-channels. Here we have loose, incoherent 

 sandstones, shales, and clays, carved, by a net-work of running waters, 

 into domes and cones, with flowing outlines. But still there is no 

 vegetation, and the loose earth is naked. Occasionally, a thin stratum 

 of harder rock will be found. Such strata will here and there form 

 shelves or steps upon the sides of the mountains. 



Traces of iron, and rarer minerals, are found in these beds, and, on 

 exposure to the air, the chemical agencies give a greater variety of 

 colors, so that the mountains and cones, and the strange forms of the 

 Bad Lands, are elaborately and beautifully painted ; not with the 

 delicate tints of verdure, but with brilliant colors, that, are gorgeous 

 when first seen, but which soon pall on the senses. 



The Uinta Mountains. To the west of Green River stand the 

 "Wasatch Mountains, a system of peaks, tables, and elevated valleys, 

 having a northerly and southerly direction, nearly parallel to the 

 river. The range known as the Uinta Mountains stands at right 

 angles to the Wasatch, extending toward the east, and no definite 

 line of division can be noticed. The Wasatch is a great trunk, with 

 a branch called the Uinta. Near the junction, the two ranges have 

 about the same altitude, and the gulches of their summits are filled 

 with perpetual snow; but, toward the east, the Uinta peaks are lower, 

 gradually diminishing in altitude, until they are lost in low ridges and 

 hills. Through this range Green River runs, and a series of caiions 

 forms its channel. 



To a person studying the physical geography of this country, 

 without a knowledge of its geology, it would seem very strange that 

 the river should cut through the mountains, when apparently it might 

 have passed around them to the east, through valleys, for there are 

 such along the north side of the Uintas, extending to the east, where 

 the mountains are degraded to hills ; and, passing around these, there 



