149 



UTAH. 



As stated in the introductioD, a full canvass of this Territory could not be made 

 on account of deficiency of appropriation, and only the followiug rdsum6, tlicrefore, 

 is given : 



The Territory of Utah comprises 84,470 square miles within the thirty-seventh and 

 forty-second degrees of latitude and the one hundred and ninth and one hundred 

 and fourteenth degrees of longitude, a parallelogram 300 by 325 miles in extent, of 

 which the northeast corner is cut out, however, by the southwestern boundary of 

 Wyoming entering with a right angle ; the western line of about 70, the southern of 

 over 100 miles. The country is rugged and broken and is separated into two unequal 

 sections by the Wahsatch Mountains, which cross it from northeast to southwest, 

 while the Uintah Mountains in the northeast have an east and west extension. In 

 the southeast are extensive plateaus, and in the west a series of disconnected ridges? 

 generally extending from north to south. 



East of the Wahsatch the drainage is mostly by the streams which form the Col- 

 orado, of which the principal are the Grand and Green Eivers, and their tributaries, 

 the White, Uintah, and San Eafael. These rivers are mostly rapid, not navigable, 

 and flow through rocky cauyons, whose walls in some places rise 2,000 feet above the 

 streams. The rivers of the western half have no outlet to the ocean, but terminate 

 in the various lakes. Of these the largest is the Great Salt Lake in the northwest, 

 which is 75 miles long and about 130 broad. It is shallow, contains several islands, 

 and receives by means of the river Jordan the waters of Utah Lake, 26 miles to the 

 southeast. Several streams flow into it. It has no outlet and its waters are exceed- 

 ingly saline, containing about 22 per cent, of salt and having a specific gravity of 

 1.17. Utah Lake is a beautiful sheet of fresh water, having an area of about 130 square 

 miles, and closely hemmed in by mountains. The Sevier Eiver, rising in the south- 

 ern part of the Territory, flows north for 150 miles, receiving the San Pete and other 

 smaller streams, then bends southwest and forms Sevier Lake, nearly 100 miles south- 

 west of Great Salt Lake, and about equal in size to Utah Lake. Only that portion 

 of Utah which can be artificially watered is really arable, though lands not irrigable 

 are being more and more brought under cultivation. Of that part of the Territory 

 lying east of the Wahsatch Mountains little use has yet been made. It is mountain- 

 ous ; its valleys are about a mile above the sea-level, and it consists chiefly of graz- 

 ing and coal lands. The settled parts of the Territory lie along the western base of 

 the Wahsatch Mountains, between them and Salt Lake and Utah Lake, in Cache, 

 San Pete, and other valleys, wherever streams are so situated as to render irrigation 

 practicable. In the northern part of the Territory the Wahsatch is high, there is a 

 great accumulation of snow in winter, and the streams are largo and numerous. In 

 the southern part, though the range is nearly as high, the atmosphere is warmer and 

 there is little snow, the streams are smaller and fewer in number, and there is less 

 land capable of cultivation. The isolated ranges in the Great Basin give rise to no 

 streams of importance, and the valleys are mostly of a desert character. The possi- 

 ble amount of farming lands in Utah may safely be put at 3,000,000 acres (probably 

 an underestimate). 



The climate of Utah varies with its differing altitudes and exposures. In the lower 

 valleys it is agreeable and salubrious. The air is dry, elastic, transparent, and bracing. 

 The Great Salt Lake exercises a mollifying influence on the extremes of temperatures, 

 while the dry and absorbent character of the atmosphere relieves the oppression felt 

 in humid climates at high temperatures. The average humidity in winter is more 

 than twice as great as in summer. For the year the rain-fall averages 17.3 inches, 

 40 per cent, of which is in the spring, 9 in the summer, 25 in the fall, and 26 in the 

 winter. The meteorological registers do not show an increased moisture in the cli- 

 mate ; but Rush Ls.ke covers what was a meadow twenty years ago, and the water 



