94 Expedition to the 



ed us a more welcome refreshment, than is often in the power 

 of abundance to supply. Here was also a little wood, and 

 our badger, with the addition of a young owl, which we had 

 the good fortune to take, was very hastily cooked and eaten. 



4th. We were still passing through a barren and desolate 

 region, affording no game, and nearly destitute of wood and 

 water. Its soil is evidently the detritus of a stratum of red 

 sandstone, and coarse conglomerate, which is still the basis 

 and prevailing rock. It appears to contain a considerable 

 proportion of lime, and fragments of plaister-stone and Se- 

 lenite are often seen intermixed with it. 



Our morning's ride of sixteen miles, brought us to a place 

 where the water of the river emerges to view, rising to the sur- 

 face of that bed of sand, beneath which it had been concealed 

 for a distance of more than one hundred miles. The stream 

 was still very inconsiderable in magnitude, the water brack- 

 ish and mixed with so large a quantity of red earth, as to 

 give it the colour of florid blood. The general direction of 

 its course inclining still towards the southeast, we were now 

 induced to believe it must be one of the most considerable 

 of the upper tributaries of Red river. A circumstance tend- 

 ing to confirm this opinion, was our falling in with a large 

 and much frequented Indian trace crossing the creek, from 

 the west, and following down along the east bank. This 

 trace consisted of more than twenty parallel paths, and bore 

 sufficient marks of having been recently travelled, affording 

 an explanation of the cause of the alarming scarcity of game 

 we had for some time experienced. We supposed it to be 

 the road leading from the Pawnee Piqua village, on Red 

 river to Santa Fe. 



Two shrubby species of Cactus, smaller than the great cy- 

 lindric prickly pear, noticed near the Rocky Mountains, oc- 

 cur in the sandy plains, we were now traversing. One of these 

 which is about four feet high, and very much branched, has 

 long and solitary spines, a small yellow flower, and its fruit. 



