112 CROSSING OF BRAZOS AND COLORADO. 



the route through what is called " Walker's Pass" is said to leave the Rio 

 Grande,) a distance of only twenty miles. 



The distance from Fort Smith to Santa Fe, as measured with the 

 chain, is eight hundred and twenty miles.* 



The line of this road continued east from Fort Smith would intersect 

 the Mississippi river in the vicinity of Memphis, Tennessee, and would 

 pass through the country bordering the Arkansas river, which cannot be 

 surpassed for fertility, as the bountiful crops of cotton, corn, and other 

 products grown by the planters, abundantly evince. 



The route of my return from New Mexico in 1849, which has been 

 travelled by California emigrants every year since that time, leaves the 

 Rio Grande at a point called Dofia Ana, three hundred miles below 

 Santa Fe. 



On leaving this place, at an elevation of about four thousand feet 

 above the sea, the road for three hundred miles traverses an arid prairie 

 region, where but little wood is found except upon three ranges of 

 mountains which stretch out to the north, but do not materially obstruct 

 the passage of the road. They are covered for the most part with pine 

 timber, and abound in springs of wholesome water, making itimperative 

 upon the traveller to pass near them. Upon the route marked down, 

 the defiles have but little elevation above the general surface, and, with 

 the exception of a few miles of broken ground near the "Peak of Gau- 

 dalupe," the ascents and descents to all the undulations are gradual and 

 easy. At the southern extremity of the Gaudalupe mountains the sum- 

 mit level of the country between the Rio Grande and the Pecos is at- 

 tained, and from this point the surface declines to the borders of the 

 latter stream by a gradation almost imperceptible. Crossing the Pecos, 

 the road ascends by a grade of about five feet per mile for twenty-five 

 miles, and the traveller here finds himself upon the broad plain of the 

 " Llano estacado," which at this point divides the waters of the Rio 

 Grande from those of the Colorado. The road crosses the southern spur 

 of this plain, where it is seventy miles broad, and as firm and smooth 

 as the best McAdamized road. Thence it crosses the head branches 

 of the Colorado and the main Brazos, and leads off to a ridge which 

 terminates near Fulton, Arkansas, upon the navigable waters of Red 

 river. By leaving this ridge and crossing Red river at Preston, a good 



* The barometrical altitude of Albuquerque above tide-water is about 5,130 

 feet, and of Fort Smith about 600 feet ; making the difference in altitude, or total 

 declination eastward between the two points, 4,530 feet, or an average grade of 

 a little over 5f feet to the mile. 



