CHAPTER VIII 



A DESERT RIDE: THOUSAND PALM CANON TO 

 COACHELLA VALLEY 



Stately palm groves — Desert holly — A settler's camp — Hos- 

 pitable Edomite — Sand-dunes — Novel tobogganing — Smoke- 

 trees — The edge of cultivation — Burlap-and-hose luxury — Ef- 

 fects of erosion — Unique home-sites — Coachella Valley — Camp 

 in a mesquit — "The Twelve Apostles" — Heat minus fatigue — 

 Indio — Desert farming: dates and figs: phenomenal growths and 

 profits — The Romance of Agriculture — Sleep and dress on the 

 desert — Hot baths and watermelon. 



THIS was Sunday, and I was glad that the pas- 

 turage would allow of keeping it a day of rest 

 — a thing not always possible, even with the best 

 of intentions, in these regions where necessities of 

 forage or water often drive the unwilling traveller 

 on. During the morning I explored my surroundings, 

 and was delighted to find myself among the stately 

 groves that give this caiion its name of Thousand 

 Palms. There are several distinct clusters, each of 

 many hundreds, growing at short intervals, and in 

 side ravines are smaller groups, each showing some 

 feature of charm, strangeness, or picturesque arrange- 

 ment. In one, a narrow gallery of ochre-hued rock 

 that gave wonderful depth to the complementary 

 blue of the sky, I came on six palms that grew in a 

 compact block, as wide and thick as it was high, 

 thatched to the ground with dead, hanging fans. 

 One could cut into the mass as one would into a 

 cheese, and a fine cell could be carved out of it by 



