Ex. Doc. No, 41. 611 



track all the wny, and making towards the mountains on the west 

 of the plain until we struck the well, (Alamo Solo.) 



JVovember 27. — Marched early, anil set out for the 60 miles; af- 

 ter travelling a few miles we encountered the sand bills and heavy- 

 roads, p.nd after 6 or 8 miles, fell upon a few patches of grama 

 grass, which weve very acceptahle; we halted an hour, and set out, 

 after getting nut of our way to the northwest, finally eame in the / 

 night (31 miles from the Alarco) to the salt lake; but, alas! the 

 waters were bitter!— bitter! We halted for the night, lying until 

 '4 o'clock, and got off a little before day. 



J\^ovemher 28: — Reached the Carmisa at noon in a fog from the 

 sea, (27 miles on our march of the 27ih;) passed the bed of a for- 

 mer fresh water lake, muscles, spinelas, &c., secured a specimen of 

 each, and the clay detritus of the bottom. This plain is corered 

 in places with the small spinela, the shells are thin, and one would 

 suppose easily decayed; from which it would appear that at no dis- 

 tant day this place, v;hich is now a dry desert, from which the 

 traveller will always turn away if he can, was once a permanent 

 lake, probably bordered with the greenest products of the vegeta- 

 ble world, and cheering to the eye amidst the adjacent barren moun- 

 tains. The muscle shells were found at the zVlamo in the sands, 

 several feet under the surface. In this plain water can be found 

 by digging in any of the deep indentations or hollows; it needs a 

 curb,1)uilt like a small log hut, to keep the walls of the well from 

 caving in; the water can then be got by bailing with a shallow '• 

 basin, taking out, after every bucket or two, a panfull of sand, 

 which, being a sort of semi-fluid, rises in the well as the water^ is 

 agitated. Our animals are now over the Jornada; some of them we 

 were obliged to leave, to perish on the plain, and of those several 

 are the young horses which our men took from the drove at the 

 mouth of the Gila. It is probable that the greatest trial during a 

 horse's life is the first hard work he does, as it would he with a 

 man. The Carmisa is a place in the pass of the mountain where 

 a stream rises, and sinks again immediately. The water comes out 

 warm, and flows freely in a clear little stream towards the pfams, 

 and half a mile dcJwn it is lost in the sand; around this water the 

 carissa grows, and a species of salt grass. About this are hiLs of 

 reddish chy-seamed gypsum, like those on the Canadian forks of 

 the Arkansas; these strata are inclined in various directions, as 

 they have been upheaved by the volcanic mountnins on either side; 

 the diluvion L.ys upon this unconformably, and also in places dis- 

 turbed. The diluv'ion is composed of granite and silicious stones, 

 more or less rounded, and thick seams of mud. 



JS'ovemher 29, {Sunday.)— M<uc\ie6 at half past 8, and continued 

 up the same hollow 20 miles; at 9, we came to some palmetto trees, 

 at a spring of saltish water; on the road the agave abounded, and 

 some of the flower stalks were just budding forth; although the 

 road led up a hollow all day, still it appeared we were going down * 

 hill as the mountains appeared higher on the right and left than 

 those in front, and there wtre no trees on the hills to show the 

 "lonzontal lines. The camp is in a narrow valley, with abundance 



