328 CALIFORNIA DESERT TRAILS 



sisting of a store and half a dozen scattered build- 

 ings, mostly old or of the modem kind that does not 

 need years to make them disreputable. The popula- 

 tion might number a score when all should have re- 

 turned from "inside." A backwater of the Colorado 

 gives the place some attraction, and it appeared to 

 be well stocked with fish and waterfowl. Not only 

 the youth but the infants of Palo Verde find their 

 pleasure in this lagoon. A proud father pointed out 

 to me his boy, aged three, who he assured me was an 

 expert swimmer, while his next younger, a baby- 

 girl, was in training and showing promise. 



As for farming, the district seemed not to have 

 made a beginning. A few untidy fields could be seen, 

 but not one instance of thrifty cultivation came to 

 my notice. This settlement lies at the southern end 

 of the Palo Verde Valley, the upper part of which, as 

 the next day's travel proved, tells a very different 

 tale. No doubt the tide of prosperity, which means 

 the flow of water in the irrigation canals, is on its 

 way and will break on Palo Verde itself in due time. 



Through a pale, unpleasant land we took our way 

 again northward. There was not now much comfort 

 to be had from the mountains, for they were farther 

 away and almost lost in summer haze ; and the river 

 had dropped out of sight. The vegetation was of the 

 dismal kind usual on these silt levels, hummocks of 

 atriplex varied with an occasional mesquit. The 

 ground was cracked and gaping with heat, and the 

 so-called ranches added the last touch of depression 

 with their gunny-sacking and baling-wire make- 

 shifts. Here and there an attempt at cultivation had 



