MOUNTAIN SYSTEMS, 5 



ains, Organ mountains, Sandia mountains, Santa Fe mountains, Sierra Blanca, Sierra Mojada, 

 Sierra San Juan, Sierra de la Plata, Elk mountains, Park mountains, Medicine Bow mount 

 ains, and Black Hills. 



System No. 1 is thus but partially gorged by the Eio Grande, whose passage of the Great 

 Canon is wholly impracticable for any method of communication ; that of El Paso is practi 

 cable. It is completely cut through by the North Platte and Sweet Water, forming a prac 

 ticable route ; and is turned by the Upper Missouri. 



Low mountains or hills are known to exist between the Black Hills and the Wind Eiver 

 chain, about the headwaters of the Yellowstone and Missouri; but this region is too little 

 known to be treated of with confidence, and may have a decided effect in modifying this classi 

 fication. 



System No. 2. If, from the Great Northern Bend of the Missouri, we travel west for 450 

 miles, we come again upon what are called the Rocky mountains ; and still further west lies 

 the Coaur d Alene, or Bitter Root range, the two enclosing the Bitter Root or St. Mary s 

 valley ; and both are considered as forming a part of this system. Following it to the south, 

 it includes the Wind River chain, the Bear mountains, the Uinta mountains, and the 

 Wahsatch, which last continue as far south as it has been explored, probably forming the 

 divide between the Great Basin and the Colorado, till the junction of the latter with the 

 Gila. 



System No. 3. From the junction of the Gila and Colorado, we find continuous mountains 

 running to the northwest, and terminating at Point Conception, on the Pacific. On the 

 south they are joined by the mountains forming the peninsula of California, the junction 

 being at the San Gorgonio Pass, in latitude 33 45 . 



On the north, two chains leave this range in latitude 35. One, called the Coast range and 

 Coast mountains, lies to the west of the San Joaquin and Sacramento valleys, the waters of 

 which break through them at the Bay of San Francisco. The other, called the Sierra Nevada, 

 lies to the east of these valleys. A great depression, forming a plateau, is known to exist in 

 the Sierra Nevada in latitude 40 30 , and another in latitude 42 45 , near Lake Abert. This 

 chain may, perhaps, be considered as terminating at or in these plateaus, or to find its con 

 tinuation in the Cascade or Coast range, which extend into the British possessions, being 

 broken through by the Columbia and partly by the Klamath rivers. 



The Blue mountains, to the south of the Columbia, represented as having a general north 

 east direction, may be considered, along with the mountains mentioned since leaving the 

 Colorado, as forming system No. 3. 



The Humboldt River chain, running north and south, (where crossed,) and separating the 

 waters of the Humboldt or Mary s river from those of the Great Salt Lake Basin, is a marked 

 feature; but as to its connexion, north and south, with other ranges, nothing is certain. 



There seem good reasons for believing that the east and west ranges, represented as sepa 

 rating the Columbia River basin from the Great Basin, as well as the range represented as 

 extending west from the Vegas of Santa Clara, are only apparently such, the deception arising 

 from the overlapping of the side spurs to chains, the general direction of which is north and 

 south. 



The &quot;triangular space&quot; lying between the Rio Grande, Gila, and Colorado, is everywhere, 

 so far as known, exceedingly mountainous ; the ranges, such as the Mogollon and San Fran 

 cisco mountains, having a general northwest direction. Too broad an interval exists between 

 the explorations of Lieutenant Whipple and those of Captain Gunnison, to enable us to speak 

 with certainty of their relation to the systems already alluded to. 



In portions of the mountain region, the waters find no outlet to the sea, but drain into 

 lakes and ponds, or sinks, carrying with them all the impurities of the basins to which they 

 belong, and are there uniformly brackish or very salt. Prominent examples of this are the 

 Salinas Basin, of New Mexico, and the Great Salt Lake Basin in Utah. 



