THE SCENEEY OF THE DESEET. 
81 
west have given the name of “ water-pockets.” They are very common in 
the stream-beds which bear away the wash from the Permian and lower 
Triassic shales. These shales yield a very fine impervious clay, which 
forms an excellent “ puddling” for water holes and basins. The Wild Band 
pockets have received their name from the fact that they are the resort of 
bands of wild horses that roam over these deserts, far from human haunts, 
ranging from spring to spring, which they visit by stealth only at night, and 
never so long as they can find chance water in these and other pockets. 
Beyond the Wild Band Valley there is a slight ascent to a rocky platform, 
consisting of the summit beds of the Carboniferous. In the course of 20 
miles we have crossed the entire Permian series, which now lies to the north 
of us. A few stunted cedars, most of which are dead or dying of drought, 
are scattered over this platform and give us until nightfall some slight shel- 
ter from the sun. It is as good a camping place as we are likely to find, 
and if we are fortunate enough to reach it after a copious shower, the hol- 
lows and basins in the flat rocks may contain a scanty supply of clear rain- 
water. It is a good locality, also, from which we may overlook the out- 
spreading desert, which is not without charms, however repulsive in most 
respects. 
To the northward rises the low escarpment of the Permian, forming a 
color picture which is somewhat indistinct through distance, but weird be- 
cause of its strange colors and still stranger forms. Beyond and in the far 
distance rise the towering fronts of the Vermilion Cliffs, ablaze with red 
light from the sinking sun. To the eastward they stretch into illimitable 
distance, growing paler but more refined in color until the last visible prom- 
ontory seems to merge its purple into the azure of the evening sky. Across 
the whole eastern quarter of the horizon stretches the long level summit of 
the Kaibab as straight and unbroken as the rim of the ocean. To the 
southwestward rises the basaltic plateau of Mount Trumbull, now present- 
ing itself with somewhat imposing proportions. Around it a great multi- 
tude of basaltic cinder cones toss up their ominous black waves almost as 
high as Trumbull itself Their tumultuous pi'ofiles and gloomy shades form 
a sharp contrast with the rectilinear outlines and vivid colors of the region 
roundabout. 
6 a c 
