TO THE COCO-MARICOPA VILLAGES. 205 
to it before it could be drawn out. We now con- 
tinued another half mile near the base of a black-look- 
ing rocky bluff without a tree to shade us. I thought 
it best to stop here, as we could not reach the next 
bend in the river before the sun would be too far up 
to travel. The bottom-land, or valley, which is visible 
Basin of the Gila, 
from the summit of this bluff for twenty miles, is alto- 
gether sand, with a few clumps of willows on the mar- 
gin of the river. Not an acre of arable land is visible. 
The bluff, which is but the termination of the plateau 
or desert, rises about one hundred and twenty feet 
above the bed of the stream. The river from here is 
quite open on the north and west, so that the moun- 
