266 TlCUfmr OF BJtAM, RIVEK. 



that ^ard it from the world without The only feasible entrance if 

 upon the east side through a remarkable canon sixty yards wide, formed by 

 craggy rocks six or eight hundred feet in altitude, succeeded by a stiU 

 narrower and more precipitous one, towering to a height of twelve or fifteen 

 hundred feet. 



This valley is intersected by Green river, which, emerging from the lofty 

 ridges above, and tracing its way through the narrow and frightful canons 

 below, here presents a broad, smooth stream., fifty or sixty yards wide, with 

 ■loping banks, and passably well timbered. 



Here all the various wild fruits indigenous to the country are found in 

 great abundance, with countless multitudes of deer, elk, and sheep. 



The soil is of a dark loam, very fertile and admirably adapted to cultiva- 

 tion. Vegetation attains a rank growtli and continues green the entire 

 year. 



Spring wedded to summer seems to have chosen tliis sequestered spot 

 for her fixed habitation, where, when dying autumn woos the sere frost and 

 enow, of whiter she may withdraw to her fiower-garnished retreat and 

 smile and bloom forever. 



The surrounding mountains are from fifteen hundred to two thousand 

 feet high, and present several peaks where snow claims an unyielding do- 

 minion year after year, in awful contrast with the beauty and lovehnesa 

 that lies below. 



Few localities in the mountains are equal to this, in point of beautiful and 

 romaiitic scenery. Every thing embraced in its confines tends to inspire 

 the beholder with commingled feelings of awe and admiration. 



Its long, narrow gate-way, walled in by huge impending rocks, for hun- 

 dreds of feet in altitude, — the lofty peaks that surround it, clothed in eternal 

 enow, — the bold stream traversing it, whose heaving bosom pours sweet 

 music into the ears of hstening solitude, — the verdant lawn, spreading far 

 and wide, garnished with blushing wild-flowers and arrayed in the habili- 

 ments of perennial spring, — all, all combine to invest it with an enchant- 

 ment as soul-expanding in its subhmity as it is fascinating in its loveliness. 



The country contiguous to Bear river, back from the valley^j. is generally 

 rugged and sterile. Sometimes the surface for a considerable extent is 

 entirely destitute of vegetation, and presents a dreary waste of rocks, or clay 

 hardened to a stone-like consistency by the sun's rays. Now and then a 

 few dwarfish' pines and cedars meet the eye amid the surroumling desola- 

 tion, and occasional clusters of coarse grass intervene at favoring depres- 

 eions among the rocks. 



FARTHEST northern extremity of Mexico, where the line between the two countriM 

 shall commenije, and thence run due west to the Pacific ? 



But, histead of bemg in lat. 42" nortli, the source of the Arkansas is in lat. 39* 

 north, as hidisputably ascertained from recent explorations, and tlius an interval of 

 three degrees occurs between the two points named in the above treaty ! 



If the Unitjd States are obligated by this treaty to receive the 42d degree as their 

 southern boundary, Meiico is equally obligated to receive the parallel from the souro* 

 ef the Axkanaas duo west Do the Pacific, as her true northern limits ; thus, a terriuav 

 ti eleven hundred and twenty-five miles from east to west, and nevly oas haoaill 

 md forty torn north to loulli, ia leil unowned by either puty I 



