CHAPTER YII. 



THE VALLEY OF THE TURGATOIRE, 



A Glance of the Country ahead. — ^The Ai-kansas Perry-boat. — Boggs' EaDche, 

 or the First Mexican Settlement. — ^Its Inhabitants and their Progenitors, — 

 Colonel Bent and his Sons. — Ute Indians. — The Valley almost uninhabited. 

 ■ — Its Great Fertility. — Its Fauna. — Land easily Iii^igated. — "We leave 

 the Valley for the Plateau above. — "Bear Eock. — Photographers in DiflB- 

 culties, — The Great Canon of the Purgatoire.- — Origin of the Name. — ^We 

 Capture Cattle.— Trinidad, — Lynch Law. — Fighting at Trinidad. 



Distance : — ^In a dii'cct line, 90 miles from Fort Lyon to Ptaton Mountains. 



We left Fort Lyon on tlie 22ncl of July, and camped at tlie 

 foot of the first range of mountains which barred onr west- 

 Trard course on the 4th of the follo'wing month, having 

 travelled a distance of about 100 miles. These mountains 

 form the Eaton range^ and jut out into the plains almost in a 

 due easterly direction from the eastern main chain of the 

 Eocky Mountains : about lat. 37^. 



The summits are mostly flat, resemblingj at first sight^ 

 huge masses of mesa land with steep sloping sides ; but on 

 inspection they differ entirely from the latter, being of vol- 

 canic origiuj and representing a true local range, formed partly 

 by upheaval, and partly by the solidification of molten matter 

 poured out from the earth upon the elevated portions. This 

 basaltic coating does not extend farther than about twenty-five 

 miles east from Trinchera Pass, situated about the centre of 

 the range. Here the mountains become flattened, and pro- 

 lono^ed into true mesa country, which extends as an undu- 

 lating plateau some distance between the heads of the 

 Cimarron and Purgatoire rivers, under the name of the Mesa 



