CHAPTER XVIII 



A DESERT RIDE: IMPERIAL VALLEY TO YUMA 



Night farming — A night ride — The sentiment of wonder — Wind, 

 silence, and solitude — Camp at the Algodones — The desert's 

 moods — New experience for Kaweah — Sand in action — A 

 study in simplicity — Pilot Knob — Mirages — The Colorado 

 River — Kaweah and the subconscious — Yuma, a frontier town 



— The river-steamers — Attractions of Yuma — Indian costumes 



— A wide view — A Bret Hartean specimen — Yuma types — The 

 movies: "one touch of nature" — Farming country — Indian 

 vs. Mexican taste — The Laguna Dam — Village of Potholes — 



— Mosquitoes — The saguaros — A fantastic region — The elf-owl. 



THE "edge of cultivation" is as sharply marked 

 on the east side of Imperial Valley as on the 

 west. The farthest "ditch" draws the line between 

 green and gray. Beyond it a long dry march lay 

 before me, with Yuma, on the Arizona side of the 

 Colorado River, for my objective. In view of the 

 great heat, made doubly trying by a high degree of 

 humidity, I resolved for Kaweah's sake to cover as 

 much as possible of it by night. 



Leaving Holtville in the afternoon I rode east- 

 ward a few miles to the farthest outpost of the canal 

 system. The district (Number Seven as it is called, 

 the valley being divided into numbered irrigation 

 units) had a more attractive look than some locali- 

 ties I had seen, with better houses, bigger stacks of 

 hay, and more frequent trees along the roads. To 

 south and west ran the long line of the Cocopas, 

 to-day showing that smoky-white hue that gives 

 desert mountains their most weird appearance. 



