260 ON THE FRONTIER 



volume of pent-up water surges and raves along through 

 the deep canons of its upper portion, and widening out as 

 it leaves its last rocky portal, floods the bottoms for miles 

 in width. And then, assuming a steady and equal flow, 

 commences to deposit a sediment from the sand and soil, 

 with which a thousand tributary mountain-streams have 

 charged it. This sediment is very fertile, and no sooner 

 has the river subsided which it generally does in a week 

 or ten days than a tropical vegetation starts up; and 

 growing with magical rapidity, soon covers the face of the 

 valley. 



This country, now a wilderness sparsely inhabited by 

 scattered bands of Indians, has a great future before it. 

 Its intense heat excepting during the winter months the 

 regularity and certainty of its being periodically overflown, 

 its almost total immunity from rainfall, its fertility and the 

 facility with which it can be irrigated, render it admirably 

 adapted for the production of all such tropical lowland 

 plants as are either annuals, or able to endure occasional 

 slight frosts in January. The navigation of the river, though 

 intricate, is always practicable for fair-sized steamers as 

 far as the mouth of the Canon Grande; sand-bars being 

 the only obstacles, and grounding on these involves no 

 danger, only at most a short detention. The sand forming 

 the bars is of a loose shifting nature, readily allowing a 

 steamer to be warped through or backed off, and a deeper 

 channel can always be found by seeking it. There are 

 many extensive belts of large cottonwood trees along the 

 Colorado, sufficient to furnish steam-boat fuel for many 

 years. Coal will be found I have myself seen numberless 



