172 



THE AUEIFEEOUS GEAVELS OF THE SIEEEA NEVADA. 



hood where there is an east course for even a short distance. The only case of the kind which 

 came to our notice was where the present Greenhorn, a little above Quaker Hill, runs for a couple 

 of hundred feet in an east and northeast direction in order to get around a high spur of rock. 



I have thus completed the arrangement of my notes on the You Bet and Eed Dog gravel deposit, 

 and shown where the main difficulties of the problem lie. There seems to be no one answer to the 

 questions proposed which will satisfy all the conditions. If we suppose the deep channel below 

 You Bet to be the continuation of the stream which flowed by Eed Dog, we are confronted by a 

 rise in the bed-rock, which obliges the water to run up hill, or, at the best, with an almost abso- 

 lutely level river bed for a distance of more than a mile and a half. Low places and holes may 

 occur, it is true, in the beds of running streams, and there may be long stretches where the fall is 

 only slight ; but if that had been the case between Eed Dog and the site of Niece and West's 

 claim, it seems to me that we should find a finer gravel than we do find, or perhaps only a sandy 

 mud. And, furthermore, wherever the deep bed-rock is exposed, the indications are strong that 

 there was once a current of considerable rapidity. It is indeed possible, in spite of these objec- 

 tions, that the connection of the channels was as has been supposed, but the most that can be 

 claimed for the theory is that there has been as yet no insuperable obstacle found in the way. 



If, on the other hand, we attempt to find any different source for the You Bet channel we are 

 soon driven to the wall by the high slate-rock whose existence is proven at so many places between 

 Chicken Point and Boston Hill. The nearly uniform elevation of the highest bed-rock, at the four 

 points where measurements were taken, is rather remarkable, though the coincidence may have 

 been only accidental. The general slope from the highest bed-rock towards the west is in all cases 

 very rapid, as is seen by reference to the observations at different points lower down. These cir- 



t 



cumstances point rather to a long easterly " rim,- than to a district through which a channel from 

 the east is to be looked for. To be sure, there is a possibility that the upper part of the You Bet 

 channel may have skirted along the base of the bluff; and to such a theory a degree of probability 

 is given by the shape of the bed-rock at Hussey's Mine, of which an east and west section has been 

 already given (see Plate F, Fig. 5), though there is no other positive evidence to adduce, and there 

 are some reasons which may be urged in opposition. 



And, again, it is possible that the key to the solution of the problem still lies hidden underneath 

 the lava flow which terminates so abruptly at Chalk Bluffs. There may have been a small water- 

 course — or even more than one — which had its origin at some point considerably higher up the 

 mountains, and down the steep bed of which the lava found an easy path. Indeed, the presence 

 of the lava itself indicates that there was some shallow trough in which it could flow. On this 

 supposition we should not look upon the You Bet channel (in its deepest portion) as a part of a 

 long and deep stream, but rather as the lower end of a large ravine or small creek, originally dis- 

 tinct from the Eed Dog Eiver, but connected with it after the partial filling up of the channels with 

 gravel. As a part and parcel of this same theory we can suppose that the original Missouri Canon 

 is represented in part by the gravel which now extends from the Cozzens and Garber shaft to Eed 

 Dog. In these suppositions there is nothing incompatible with the final covering over of a large 

 extent of country, including not only the ravines but the intervening ridges. In opposition, chiefly 

 to the latter part of the theory, Ave have Mr. Bowman's observations of the Eed Dog pot-holes, 

 and his conviction that the stream made a bend to the east at that point. And, furthermore, in 

 supposing the original drainage to have been almost identical with that of the present day and that 

 there was a canon or ravine from the east, corresponding to the present Missouri Canon and empty- 

 ing into the main channel at Eed Dog, we meet with difficulty in fixing both the outlet below Eed 



If we could have seen the ground before the accu- 



Dog and the source of the canon to the east. 



mulation of tailings in Missouri Canon it is barely possible that a more satisfactory conclusion 

 might have been reached. The fact that there was slate-rock to be seen in the bed of the, canon, 

 between the high gravel at the base of the bluffs and the deep gravel at Red Dog, taken in con- 

 nection with the depth of the gravel at the Cozzens and Garber shaft, and the general appearance 

 of the country, may have been an important element in the settling of our doubts. 





