292 CALIFORNIA DESERT TRAILS 



I would suggest that the existence of this plague- 

 hole on the border at once provides it. 



A couple of burly brigands with huge pistols pro- 

 jecting from their hip-pockets, who were lounging 

 over the barricade of another of the gambling-dens, 

 proved to be rurales, members of that peculiar but 

 efficient force that Mexico owes, along with much 

 else that is questionable but necessary, to Porfirio 

 Diaz. At the custom-house and post-office a trifling 

 amount of business was being neglected, rather than 

 transacted, by two irresponsible and highly unat- 

 tractive clerks. Half an hour was enough of this. 

 I managed a surreptitious photograph, to the mysti- 

 fication of a Cocopa "buck" with hair to his waist 

 and fat squaw following, and recrossed to United 

 States soil. 



In the eastern part of the valley lies Holtville, 

 a small but fairly lively place on the bank of the 

 Alamo River, which flows, thick and sluggish, in a 

 deep gorge with steep red walls and a trimming of 

 rustling cottonwoods. Red and green, with overhead 

 blue of sky, make the livery of the Imperial Valley. 



One day while at my friend's ranch we were visited 

 by a typical summer storm. The day was unusually 

 humid, and we sat in collapse by the hour, existing 

 on the momentary breezes from the Gulf. About 

 mid-morning a brown wall suddenly grew up on the 

 open desert to the east. It came rapidly nearer, 

 growing higher every moment, and was soon revealed 

 as a cloud of sand, so dense as to seem solid, and 

 driven at wonderful speed. Its even line was very 

 remarkable: it came on like a tidal wave, and not 



