GEOGRAPHICAL PROGRESS AND DISCOVERY IN 1875. 



335 



veyed by Commander George Dewey, of the 

 Narragansett. The gulf has not before been 

 surveyed, but has now been well enough ex- 

 amined to render navigation safe. The coast 

 by the mouth of the Rio de la Plata has been 

 surveyed by Commander A. J. Mahan, of the 

 Wasp. It is proposed to make a running sur- 

 vey of the coast of Guatemala, making the 

 surveys continuous from Behring's Straits to 

 Cape Horn. The Tuscarora has been continu- 

 ing the soundings in the Pacific, having run 

 another line from San Francisco to the Sand- 

 wich Islands, and on her return .made some 

 soundings between the Navigator Islands and 

 Honolulu. The interoceanic survey, which 

 has been carefully pursued for the five last 

 seasons by two or more parties, has been com- 

 pleted, the surveyed district extending from 

 the isthmus of Tehuantepec to about twenty 

 miles south of the mouth of the Napipi. A 

 careful survey has been made of the isthmus 

 of Panama, and the results placed before the 

 Interoceanic Canal Commission. 



In the above-mentioned useful survey, which 

 was recently made of the peninsula of Lower 

 California, by the U. S. steamship Narragan- 

 sett, the geological portion was conducted by 

 Assistant-Surgeon Thomas N. Streets, who in- 

 vestigated minutely the geological character 

 and mineral products of the peninsula and ad- 

 jacent islands. He found fossil shells imbed- 

 ded in the rock 1,000 feet above the level of 

 the sea, which correspond to species now ex- 

 isting, indicating that the peninsula was at no 

 distant age a group of scattered islands, and 

 has been elevated since the beginning of the 

 post-Pliocene epoch. The high, mountainous 

 region, at the southern end of the peninsula, 

 was the only large island. 



The principal work of the Hayden Explor- 

 ing Expedition this year has been in Colorado, 

 completing the explorations carried on in 1873 

 and 1874, finishing the southern and south- 

 western sections, and including parts of North- 

 ern New Mexico and Eastern Utah. The 

 operations in the southeast of Colorado were 

 directed by A. D. Wilson, going over an area 

 of 12,400'square miles. The district comprises 

 the lower elevations of the front range sloping 

 eastward, the southern portion of the Sangre 

 de Cristo Mountains, the southern part of the 

 San Luis Valley, the continuation of the La 

 Plata Mountains, and the tract drained by the 

 Lower Rio San Juan. South of the Rio Grande 

 a high plateau was discovered instead of clear- 

 ly-defined mountain-chains. This was scat- 

 tered over with many isolated volcanic peaks. 

 The valleys between the Rio Pinos and the 

 Rio Piedra are fertile, with pastures and tim- 

 ber. Proceeding down the La Plata range to 

 the San Luis Valley, the traces of two large 

 lakes, of an early geological era, were discov- 

 ered. The southwestern district, surveyed by 

 the party under W. H. Holmes, containing 

 6,500 square miles, lying southward from par- 

 allel 37 30' north, is drained by the San Juan, 



the La Plata, the Mancos, and the Dolores. The 

 geological formation of this region is of sedi- 

 mentary rock, principally lower cretaceous, 

 with a considerable extent of upper cretaceous 

 and some lignite. The cretaceous deposits 

 both contain coal. Fossils in ten different 

 horizons were discovered. In this section 

 cliff-houses were found, and graves and skele- 

 tons of the ancient races; also many pieces 

 of pottery, stone arrow-heads, axes, ear-orna- 

 ments, ropes and mats, jars, and corn and 

 beans, were dug up under one of /the houses. 

 The western division was conducted by Henry 

 Gannet. The fourth division, under G. R. 

 Bechler, surveying a considerable tract from 

 the foot-hills of the Rocky Mountains to the 

 Lower Arkansas and between Pike's and 

 Long's Peaks, was attacked by a party of Ute 

 Indians. The photographer, Mr. Jackson, visit- 

 ed the seven prehistoric Moqui cities, and exam- 

 ined the ruins found north of the country of 

 the Moqui Pueblos. He brought back a hun- 

 dred or more views, many of them most in- 

 teresting representations of the cliff-dwellings. 

 He has made a model of a row of these struct- 

 ures, and brought back also an interesting col- 

 lection of clay utensils. The remains of one 

 of these settlements, which he found in a cave, 

 he describes as follows : 



Imagine a perpendicular bluff nearly 300 feet ia 

 height, the upper half of which is a firm, white sand- 

 stone, and the lower half a dull-red, soft, and pliable 

 variety. Time has excavated an almost perfectly 

 hemispherical cave in this bluff, equally divided be- 

 tween the two kinds of rock. It is 250 feet wide, 

 200 feet deep, and the same from top to bottom at 

 its outer face. Midway between the top and bottom, 

 and running completely around the halt-circle which 

 formed the back of the cave, are two benches, upon 

 the upper of which is built the town, or series of 

 rooms, 200 feet in length in the aggregate, the lower 

 serving as a walk or promenade, from which access 

 could only be had by ladders. A little to the left 

 of the centre is the principal building, consisting of 

 three rooms, each two stories in height, and now 

 standing twelve feet high. Adjoining it on the 

 irtments, built as a 



solid block, and on the left an open space of sixteen 

 feet, and then another small building. In the open 

 space were four holes, four inches in diameter and 

 twelve deep, drilled into the rock, serving evidently 

 as post-holes for a loom. All the rooms have been 

 burned out clean, so that not a vestige of woodwork 

 remains. The walls are remarkably well preserved, 

 the adobe mortar on the inside still retaining the 

 impression of the delicate lines on the thumbs and 

 fingers of the builders. Impressions of the whole 

 hand were frequent, showing it to be small and 

 finely formed. Corn-cobs and pieces of pottery 

 were found imbedded in the mortar. In the centre 

 of the larger rooms, beneath the debris, were found 

 the fireplaces circular excavations, which still re- 

 tained the charred wood and ashes of aboriginal 

 fires. 



A considerable range of architectural skill 

 is discovered in these buildings. In some of 

 the canons the houses extend uninterruptedly 

 for twenty-five miles; and, indeed, there is 

 scarcely an available break in the rocky cliffs 

 and dry canons in all this region which .is not 

 occupied by them. Many of the villages, now 



