427 
[Wright. 
productive and sub-irrigates. The foot hills show some signs of 
lava. The first plateau is some sixty feet higher than the river, 
from five to eight miles in width, is a rich, sandy loam soil with strata 
of heavy gravel and bowlders underlying it at a depth of from ten 
to thirty feet. It contains several dry creeks with sandy bottoms, 
but which contain plenty of water at a depth of from two to four 
feet. These creeks rise at the foot of the mountain range more 
than one hundred miles east of here and flow through the second 
plateau. 
The second plateau is some thirty feet above the first and em- 
braces the balance of the valley. The soil same as first and extends 
to the lava flow which seems to be uniform at a depth of say sixty- 
five feet ; it sometimes contains a heavy coarse sand. This plateau 
is much broken with hilly elevations of lava rock, which contains 
caves and dark subterranean passages, that are full of strong cur- 
rents of air. 
4. We found no evidence of bowlders anywhere. I will inclose 
with the image some of the pebbles taken out at different times, 
although we did not find any deposit of them. The large clay ball 
may be of some interest to you, it stuck to the bottom of the sand 
pump ; it and many of the smaller ones were found about the same 
time as the image and on top of the primitive formation. We have 
no means here of having the image photographed so I will send it 
by express, hoping it will interest you. Please examine and at 
your earliest convenience return to me. The image was dropped 
and the head broken and we fastened it on as well as we could. 
Any further information I can give will be cheerfully given. 
Very respectfully yours, 
M. A. Kurtz. 
Upon receipt of this I addressed another letter to Mr. Kurtz to 
draw out from him such explicit statements as should enable us to 
determine whether or not the image might have fallen in from the 
top, or been thrown in by some bystander. The letter of October 
1 1th answers these inquiries. I would add that the “ clay balls” 
referred to which came up in the pump are larger than the image, 
and equally fragile. They seem as I remember them to be of the 
same material with the image, but were coated over with a film of 
oxide of iron. 
