188 NEW TRACKS IN NORTH AMERICA. 
the slopes of the Sierra Nevada and the Tulare and San j 
Bernardino valleys of California. The Mormons raise a , 
great deal of cotton at their settlements. On the Virgin 4 
and its tributaries, 150 miles north of Fort Mojave, they have ; 
several cotton factories in operation, and are building more. 4 
They also raise some sugar. | 
‘‘ At present the Mojaves, Chemenevis, and other populous ~ 
tribes of Indians inhabiting the valley of the Colorado, raise 4 
corn, wheat, beans, melons, and squashes ; and a large amount 
_ of hay is cut by them for Fort Mojave and the mining stock — 
near Hardyville. Wheat ripens in April; barley harvest — 
takes place in May. There is as yet no artificial irrigation, 
the valley being inundated annually by the river, which rises 3 
seventy-five feet in summer from the melting of the snows | 
at its mountain sources. We found some stalks of fine Sea 
Island cotton growing here near Hardy’s Mine, about 1,000 j 
feet above the river, and melons were brought in by the 4 
Indians on Christmas week. 
‘From the head of navigation at Callville, for sixty miles 
down to Cottonwood Valley, there is no bottom-land. In~ 
this stretch occur Black Cafion and Painted Cafion. In 
Cottonwood Valley, which is from one to five miles in width, | 
there are about twenty square miles of arable land, which the 
Mormons talk of occupying for cotton plantations. Thence ~ 
the river flows for twenty-five miles through Pyramid and q 
other lesser caiions to a point three miles above Fort Mojave, ; 
where the bottom widens out on both sides of the river, in — 
some places to ten miles, and so continues to where our line : 
crosses it three miles above the ‘Needles.’ This is the : 
Mojave valley; it is rich in soil, and contains about 100 © 
square miles, of which over one-half is covered with cotton- q 
wood and mezquit trees. Below our crossing occur the — 
