208 



THE DESERT 



Arida zona. 



Cloud- 

 bursts on 

 the mesas. 



The wash of 

 rains. 



that the early Spaniards had found it that and 

 called it arida zona for cause.* 



Yet at times it is a land of heavy cloud-bursts 

 and wash-outs. In the summer months it fre- 

 quently rains on the mesas in torrents. The 

 hare surface of the country drains this water al- 

 most like the roof of a house because there are 

 no grasses or bushes of consequence to check 

 the water and allow it to soak into the ground. 

 The descent from the Divide to the Colorado 

 Kiver is quite steep. The flood of waters rushes 

 down the steps of the mesas and over the bare 

 ground with terrific force. It quickly cuts 

 channels in the low places down which are 

 hurled sand, gravel, and bowlders. The cutting 

 of the channel during the heavy rains is some- 

 thing extraordinary, partly because the stream 

 has great volume and fall, and partly because 

 the channel-bed is usually of soft rock and easily 

 cut. In a few dozen years the arroyo of a mesa 

 that carries off the water from the mountain- 

 range has cut a river-bed many feet deep ; in a 



* The late Dr. Elliot Coues and others reject the obvi- 

 ous arida zona of the Spanish in favor of some strained 

 etymologies from the Indian dialects, about which no two 

 of them agree. Why should the name not have come 

 from the Spanish, and why should it not mean juat 

 ply arid zone or belt ? 



