234 GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF THE TEREITORIES. 



SOUTHEEK SECTION OF DENVER DISTEICT. 



Passing across the Platte, going soutli, we enter upon a section wliere 

 a consideralble change of scenery is at once apparent, and where the 

 geographical arrangement is entirely different from that we saw north 

 of the river. There we saw a regular succession of cool, limpid streams 

 rushing down from the Eocky Mountain gorges, furrowing their way 

 through the plains eastward to the Platte, the great central artery of 

 the district. Here we find an irregular arrangement of long, slender 

 streams, arising chiefly within the space of forty miles along the north- 

 ern slope of the Divide. Carrying their volumes of water down this 

 descent, they enter upon the broad, comparatively level, and somewhat 

 sandy plains, and receiving but few tributaries, they struggle against 

 the rapid absorption of the porous soil, growing feebler and feebler, till 

 finally, in the dry season, they are lost, without reaching the Platte. 

 Plum Creek, which lies next the mountains, is perhaps the only exception. 

 It follows, then, that the tillable part of this section is confined to the 

 valleys along the upper portions of these streams. There is also a 

 marked difference between the valleys of these streams and those north, 

 in this : while the latter in most cases have bottoms of greater or less 

 width on both sides, which are flanked by terraces with graceful, grassy 

 escarpments, the streams south, cutting through the deep sandy deposit, 

 generally have on one or the other side steep, bluffy banks of crumbling- 

 sand, reaching the surface of the second bottom. And even the bottoms 

 which do border these streams very often appear to be irregular flats^ 

 scooped out of the higher land which once liressed close on the central 

 channel. But these flats, where they can receive sufficient water, are 

 exceedingly rich and productive, yielding some of the heaviest crops of 

 the Territory. 



In regard to the various valleys of this section, and the extent to 

 which they can be cultivated, I can at this time give but an approximate 

 estimate. 



Beginning at the base of the mountains, and moving eastward along 

 the northern slope of the Divide, the first stream we reach is Plum Creek, 

 which has two branches. East Plum Creek and West Plum Creek, the 

 one flowing from the mountains, the other from the Divide. This has a 

 run of some twenty-five miles before reaching the Platte. It furnishes 

 water most of this distance, and has some fine bottom lands on it, a 

 good part of which is already under cultivation or occupied. 



The next stream in our course eastward is Cherry Creek, whiqh has 

 quite a number of small affluents entering into it from the rounded hills 

 on each side. From its source to its mouth is a distance of some forty- 

 five or fifty miles, affording water for irrigation the gTcater part of its 

 length, but drying up near its terminus at the city of Denver. This 

 valley is quite fertile, and tolerably well settled at the more attractive 

 points. 



The other creeks succeed each other in the following order : Eunning 

 Creek, Kiowa, Wolf, and Bijou ; in regard to which I have received but 

 little information. They generally dry up on the plains during the sum- 

 mer and fall, affording water for irrigation from twenty to thirty miles 

 from their sources. Their valleys are as yet but sparsely settled. On 

 the immediate slope of the Divide, in the bottoms which flank these 

 streams, irrigation is generally unnecessary, as a sufScient amount of 

 rain falls to supply the crops with the necessary amount of moisture to 

 mature them. 



