The Alamogordo Desert 159 



The lava constitutes one of the features of this remark- 

 able desert; there is yet another. Along the western 

 border, partly by erosion, partly uncovered by the west- 

 ern winds, great bodies of gypsum lie exposed. As this 

 slowly disintegrates the wind gathers the particles set 

 free and bears them eastward; the famous white sands, 

 covering township after township with drifted mineral, 

 white as snow. Vast windrows shifting slowly with every 

 storm, and forever reinforced by the unceasing contribu- 

 tions of the west, mark the landscape over several hun- 

 dred square miles, unique, intact, forever changing, yet 

 the same forever. 



Added to these peculiar and special topographic de- 

 tails of this surprising desert we have, of course, those 

 less noteworthy, the common every-day features of desert 

 make-up : we have mountain slopes, rocky fields and hill- 

 sides, eroded valleys, marshy sinks, where lose themselves 

 the vanishing torrential streams; wide plains of marly 

 clay; belts of sand-dunes, red sands, yellow sands, also 

 shifting and moving, but better subservient to the vege- 

 tation of the region, these present simply vast fields of 

 low hills or hummocks ten to twenty feet in height, sep- 

 arated on every side by tortuous valleys, winding in 

 labyrinthine fashion, wind-swept hard and bare. 



One other topographic feature must be added to com- 

 plete our picture. The forces of erosion even along the 

 mountain walls have kept pace fairly well, at least, with 

 the changes in level. Great canons break back even 

 through the hard, encrinitic limestones, dividing again 

 and again where the waters have carved the rugged path- 

 way by which the explorer may now reach the mountain 



