CHAPTER V 
THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS 
From Alaska we retrace our steps to Canada, by that magni- 
ficient mountain range popularly known as the “ Rockies.” 
I have already mentioned that the Rocky Mountains prac¬ 
tically end near the shores of the Arctic Ocean. They begin 
in northern Mexico. Although we can approximately fix 
the beginning and end of this vast range of mountains and 
even its eastern border, the western boundaries are more 
vague and indefinite. In British Columbia, which is so famed 
for its grand and impressive scenery, its rugged mountains 
and great forests, the northern spurs of the Cascade Moun¬ 
tains appear to merge into the Rockies, so that it becomes a 
matter of some difficulty to discriminate clearly between the 
two. Further south the Rocky Mountains cross the high 
plateau of Wyoming, sometimes spoken of as the “ Laramie 
region.” We also meet here the complex mountain groups to 
which the name of “ Stony Mountains ” has been applied. 
South of the plateau the mountains again grow more irregular 
and lofty than to the north of it. Another great plateau covers 
part of southern Utah, western Colorado, New Mexico and 
northern Arizona. With a height of over 6,000 feet above 
sea-level, this region has suffered great erosion, and is deeply 
trenched by fantastic gorges which intersect it in every direc¬ 
tion. The most famous of them, the Colorado Canon, is a 
clean-cut chasm, which, in the course of ages, has been slowly 
carved by the river to the stupendous depth of 6,000 feet 
in the horizontal strata. 
It is not only the lover of scenery, but particularly the 
naturalist and palaeontologist who appreciate the unrivalled 
attractions of the Rocky Mountains. These mountains, more 
over, have been the direct means of exposing what are probably 
