THE BOTTOM OF THE BOWL 



47 



been entering the Gnlf far down on the eastern 

 side at an acute angle. Gradually its deposits 

 had been building up, banking up ; and grad- 

 ually the river had been pushing them out and 

 across the Gulf in a southwesterly direction. 

 Finally there was formed a delta dam stretch- 

 ing from shore to shore. The tides no longer 

 brought water up and around the bases of the 

 big mountains. Communication with the sea 

 was cut off and what was once the top of the 

 Gulf changed into an inland lake. It now had 

 no water supply from below, it lay under a 

 burning sun, and day by day evaporation car- 

 ried it away. 



No one knows how many days, how many 

 years, elapsed before the decrease of the water 

 became noticeable. Doubtless the lake shrunk 

 away slowly from the white face of the sand- 

 dunes and the red walls of the mountains. 

 The river-mouths that opened into the lake 

 narrowed themselves to small stream -beds. 

 The shelving beaches where the waves had 

 fallen lazily year after year, pushing themselves 

 over the sand in beautiful water-mirrors, shone 

 bare and dry in the sunlight. The ragged 

 reefs, over which the chop sea had tumbled 

 and tossed so long, lifted their black hulks out 



The delttt 

 dam 



The inland 

 lake. 



