305 



Cbicorica Mesa, aud termiuatiug in the plains at the foot of Sierra 

 Grande, ninety miles east of the initial point. 



A, metamorphosed Mesozoic and Palseozic strata ; B, basaltic mesa 

 and benches ; 0, Cretaceous, ISTos. 1-4 ; D, scoriaceous ernptive rock ; 

 E, watershed, or main range ; T, Tertiary deposits, with coal. 



Fig. 2, plate 48, shows a similar i)rofile from the main range (E) west 

 of the Moreno Valley, across Great Baldy, upon whose eastern flank 

 the Cretaceous and Tertiary (C, T) deposits are upraised high above 

 their outcrop on the borders of the Canadian basin, which latter is 

 bounded on the east by the volcanic hills which rest upon the sediment- 

 ary deposits on the borders of the plains, some seventy miles to the 

 east of Taos Pass. 



Besides the same elements indicated by corresponding letters in the 

 l^receding ])roflle, the following additional ones are here noticed : F, 

 granitic: G, gneiss and quartzite at head of Cimarron Caiion ; H, 

 Carboniferous in Taos Caiion. 



Fig. 3, plate 48, exhibits a profile still farther to the south of the 

 former, extending above eighty miles to the east of the main water- 

 shed into the plains beyond the Canadian, and showing the great 

 basaltic overflow, reclining upon the outlying flanks of the Black Mount- 

 ain group, and terminating in the mesas of Eayado and Gouzalitas, 

 which were evidently at one time connected with the Tauaja and 

 Chicorica table-lands. 



The sections traversed by the above profiles, which are simply an 

 approximation, with no attempt at the representation of details, may 

 be traced by reference to the sketch-map.* Plate 42, fig. 1. 



THE CAPULIN. 



Late in the autumn of 1874, in company with Messrs. Springer, Morley, 

 Arms, and Porter, a brief visit was made to the Capulin country, which 

 lies to the east of the Canadian, and some sixty miles out from the 

 Spanish liange. The route followed one of the old Santa Fe freight 

 roads, via the Dry Cimarron, crossing the Canadian a short distance 

 below the mouth of Crow Creek. The road rises by a gradual ascent 

 the prairie upland to the south of Tanaja Creek, the higher portions of 

 which command extensive views of the distant mountains — the dome 

 of Great Baldy to the south, the long cumulating crest of the Costilla, 

 aud to the north the groups of the Vermejo Mountains, the peculiar 

 topographical features of which are as strikingly exhibited from this 

 great distance as when viewed from the parks at their base — beyond 

 and overtopping the Tertiary plateau, which forms an abrupt wall in 

 the middle distance along the western border of the plain of the Cana- 

 dian, whose clean carpet of gramma-grass is seldom intruded b^' the fields 

 of Arfemida so characteristic of the i)lains in other quarters. 



Pursuing an east-northeast course, in a distance of about fifteen 

 miles, the road regains the valley of Tanaja Creek, passing on the way 

 the Tauiija and Eagletail Buttes, two considerable outlying basaltic 

 elevations lying between the former stream and the Canadian, along 

 which their broad-spreading basis forms a low range of basaltic blutts. 

 The valley is here a shallow depression, inclosed by low blufts resting 

 upon shales, and terminating above in a considerable deposit of yellow- 



* It is proper, aud besides a positive pleasure, to state my iudebteduess to Messrs . 

 G. A. Biisbnell and Harry Whi<j;bani, as also to Mr. Lewis Kingman, aud my friend 

 Mr. Morley, for tbe data embodied in the sketch-map, by which I have no desire to 

 make these geutlemeu responsible for the inaccuracies, but whatever is good I gladly 

 acknowledge is their own contribution. 



