CHAPTER II.

ARIZONA THE LAND OF PLATEAUS.

The early civilizations of North America were more embarrassed in growth and more frequently broken up altogether than those of the Old World. The more imperfect development of those which continued to flourish must have been due in part to unhealthy disturbance; and the relics of lost races, the very memory of which had vanished even from the localities where they left what has not yet perished of the record of their organized industry, show the greater disadvantages that attended progress on the Western than the Eastern Continent. America was too simple and broad in the outlines of its more favored regions, and these were too readily overrun by wild highland tribes, to favor a strong and many-sided growth.

Tartary, Scythia and Germany always swarmed with roving, restless tribes, whose character and manners were as stern as their climate. They were always a terror and danger to the civilizations further south, but the readiest openings to their wanderings were east and west. High mountain ranges on the north protected Oriental, Greek and Roman civilization. The Rocky Mountain plateau seems to have been as prolific in fierce hunter tribes as those Old World regions in rude wandering warriors. They grew up there robust, healthy and aggressive, disposed to seek a more favored region, but finding it only in the direction of a progressive people.

As the Teuton, Hun, Slavic and Tartar tribes of Northern Europe and Asia from the beginning of history were a constant menace to the warm, rich countries of the South, so

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the Rocky Mountain tribes were ever pressing eastward to the Mississippi Valley or south along the plateau towards Arizona or Mexico. The specialty of the Pacific coast, for these primitive men, was its fisheries, which did not greatly invite the hunters of the interior in the North, and in California the hot, dry climate was not favorable to a large population of hunters. They do not seem to have much troubled, or mingled with, the coast tribes of Upper and Lower California, who, not being required to develop intelligence and energy in self-defense, degenerated. At least, what is known of them from the reports of the first European explorers indicates a lower type of character than elsewhere then, as in still more modern times.

It would seem that the Mound Builders of the Eastern Valley of the Mississippi long enjoyed complete immunity from attack, although the fact that they did not occupy, to any great extent, the large and fertile territories on the west of that stream would appear to imply some obstacle in that direction. But their civilization was too weak in progressive elements and too imperfect in structure to hold its ground, in the end, against the growing numbers of the fierce hunter tribes and they perished. They were not as fortunate as the Toltecs of Mexico in the twelfth century. These cultured people were conquered by the Aztecs, in arms, but were able to civilize their conquerors and commence a new era of progress, as did the Etrurians, and the Modern Latins when conquered by the Goths and Huns, the Franks and Saxons.

Arizona, with some parts of Colorado and New Mexico adjoining, is a region of plateaus-" mesas," or table-lands, the Spaniards called them. This structure was caused by the elevation of the whole region forming it at the same time so that the layers of rock-laid originally in water many thousand feet below their present altitude-did not lose their horizontal position during the elevation. This, at

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least, seems to be the prevailing fact in much of this region, especially for the higher deposits. There were, however, many breaks in the crust of this vast elevated table through which rocks lying underneath were thrust up, forming many mountain chains whose loftiest peaks rise twice as high above the level of the sea as the general surface of the plateau. The nucleus of these mountains is generally granite-the original solid floor of the first universal sea, on which the various classes of stratified rock accumulated for a hundred millions of years, perhaps.

When this plateau and these mountains were raised, began that opposite process of leveling and washing away to the sea which has caused a great part of the constant accumulation of rock, in every age, at the bottom of all waters. As each age and region contributed to the rocks it made some part of the remains of its characteristic vegetable and animal life, the geologists thereby found a clue to the history and changes of the past. But this plateau seems to have been much what it is now in climate since it was first raised. It has never been generally and freely watered by the clouds; it was so far south that the small amount of moisture it did receive on its levels and gentle slopes immediately ran off or evaporated and left the rocks bare and dry; while the snows of its mountains melted only to hurry with mad haste to the ocean by the readiest channels.

Its streams, therefore, have worn deep channels through the solid rock. These rocky gorges are called "Cañons" and constitute one of the most remarkable features of the region. The leveling process of past ages has here been more than usually confined to the production of these deep and narrow cavities, in the bottom of which the general mass of waters gathered from the whole region rushes swiftly down a steep incline to sea level. They are so confined, the descent is so great for long distances, the rocks so uniform in hardness or softness, and they carry along so much gritty material to

scour the rocks at the bottom of the stream, that they have produced effects of singular magnitude and impressiveness.

The Colorado River is about 1,200 miles in length. Its Great Cañon is 400 miles long and has, through almost the whole distance, a depth, from the top of the plateau to the surface of the river, of 4,000 to 6,000 feet. For the most part this immense gorge has perpendicular sides. Usually there is very little or no space between the stream and the smooth upright wall of rock on either side, and breaks in the continuous surface of this wall have been made only where a side stream has worn a collateral cañon back to a greater or less distance by the same friction of its waters during unknown centuries.

This long narrow trough, worn in solid rock from three quarters of a mile to a mile and a quarter straight down toward the center of the earth, and that for a continuous distance of four hundred miles, is unrivaled by a wonder of equal magnitude in all respects in any part of the earth. The great power of a running stream is here illustrated to the utmost, and produces an astonishment in the beholder quite beyond expression. Most of the streams of this elevated region have worn similar cavities, more or less deep, in some part of their course, although many of them have fine, fertile valleys of considerable width which furnish unrivaled facilities for prosperous agriculture.

The great Colorado plateau, thus seamed with deep cañons by the main river and its branches, occupies the northeast part of Arizona. Much of the higher level is 6,000, and some even 7,000, feet above the surface of the ocean. On its southern border runs the largest branch of the lower Colorado, the Gila River. This rises in New Mexico and flows almost directly westward across the southern center of Arizona. Its valley contains much fertile land with the stream available for irrigation. It has deep narrow cañons only in its upper course. Many streams flow into it, along and be

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tween which are extensive, and comparatively level, surfaces that may be irrigated.

The lowest part of Arizona is at the southwest, where the level descends within 100 feet of tide water. Several hundred thousand acres of valley land, suitable for cultivation, lie along the Colorado below the terminus of the Great Cañon. The plateau in the western center of the Territory, not being more than 4,000 feet in elevation, and its streams cutting into the rock with general moderation, contains, much agricultural land. Anciently the high plateau above the Gila and east of this lower bench was crossed from west to east by a line of volcanoes whose fires are now extinct. Many thousand square miles of the plateau have been deluged, in the neighborhood of these former craters, with lava. It is, one of the large lava fields of the world, and presents a vast sum of hopelessly bare rock, beneath which is probably concealed a great amount of mineral treasure. Several chains of mountains cross this high plain from northwest to southeast, with level spaces between on which there is more or less pulverized rock, furnishing material for a rich soil and some good opportunities for irrigation from the mountain

streams.

Some extensive forests cover the mountain sides here. One is said to be 400 miles long-part of this lying outside of Arizona-and forty miles wide. Many rich valleys and grassy levels appear, as the Colorado and New Mexico line is approached, highly promising, it is said, by the few explorers who have seen it, for the future farmer and herdsman. Yet these favorable features are, in appearance, local. The general aspect of all Arizona is one of sublime desolation.

South of the Gila the surface rocks have been more disturbed by volcanic forces, and many chains of mountains are found of various length, height and direction; yet the character of a plateau remains. A comparatively level belt in this latitude crosses the whole mountain plateau to the Rio