The Western United States Part 8

The slow crumbling of the rocks, and the setting free of those const.i.tuents which are soluble, the work of the streams in gathering the rock waste into the lakes, the dry air and the heat of the long summer days, have all conspired together to give us these valuable deposits in the dried-up lakes of the Great Basin.

No portion of the earth seems to be without value to man. The great bodies of water are convenient highways. The rich valleys and timbered mountains offer useful products. Even the deserts, where living things of every description find the struggle for existence very hard, become indispensable. If the climate in the Great Basin had been moist, the salts would not have been preserved, but would have been carried away to the ocean, from which only common salt could have been recovered in commercial quant.i.ties.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 46.--MUSHROOM ROCK, PYRAMID LAKE

Formed of calcareous tufa]

The crossing of the Great Basin was dreaded by the early emigrants on their way to the Pacific coast. In many cases the locations of the few springs and water-courses were unknown, and the journey over the vast barren stretches was fraught with danger.

Stand upon a mountain in the desert some clear day in summer and you will see range after range, with intervening sandy wastes, stretching away to the horizon. The air below is tremulous with heat, and every living thing that can move has sought the shade of some rock or cliff. The plants seem almost dead, for the little springs, hidden at rare intervals in the deep canons, are of no use to them.

What transformations would be wrought upon these desert slopes if it were possible for the soil to receive and retain large quant.i.ties of water! Forest-covered mountains, green hillsides, rippling streams, lakes, farms, orchards, and towns would appear as if by magic.

FReMONT'S ADVENTURES IN THE GREAT BASIN

Fremont, "the Pathfinder," did greater service than any other man in making known the geographic features of the Cordilleran region.

In the fifth decade of the last century, while California still belonged to Mexico and the pioneers were turning their attention to the Oregon country, Fremont organized and conducted three exploring expeditions under the direction of the government. When in California upon the third expedition he took part in the skirmishes which resulted in the transference of this section to the United States.

A fourth expedition, undertaken by Fremont on his own account, resulted disastrously. The explorers foolishly tried to cross the Rocky Mountains in the middle of winter, but had to give up the attempt after many of the party had died from cold and starvation.

It is hard for us to realize, now, that only sixty years ago the territory lying between the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific coast was practically unknown. Try to imagine the feelings of emigrants, bound for the gold-fields of California, who have pushed into the Great Basin without knowing where to look for gra.s.s or water. They are camped by a spring of alkaline water scarcely fit to drink; their weary animals nibble at the scanty gra.s.s about the spring; far ahead stretches the pathless desert which they must cross; upon their choice of a route their very lives will depend.

Now it is all changed. The whole region is crossed and recrossed by wagon roads and railways. Many mining towns are scattered through the mountains which dot the seemingly boundless expanse of desert, while in every place where water can be found there are gardens, green fields of alfalfa, and herds of cattle.

Before the year 1840 some knowledge had been acquired of the borders of the Great Basin. Trappers and explorers had crossed the Rocky Mountains and had gone down the Columbia River. There were Spanish settlements in New Mexico, Arizona, and along the coast of California.

Fremont's first expedition had taken him to the summit of the Rocky Mountains in northwestern Wyoming. In 1843 he started upon the second expedition. He was at that time commissioned to cross the Rockies, descend the Columbia to Fort Vancouver, and return by a route farther to the south, across the unknown region between the Columbia and the Colorado rivers.

Let us follow the little band of explorers led by Captain Fremont as day after day they made their way across what was then a trackless waste, and see what troubles they encountered because of the inaccuracy of the maps of that period.

Leaving Fort Vancouver, upon the lower Columbia, for the return trip, the party ascended the river to The Dalles and then turned southward along the eastern side of the Cascade Range. They soon entered upon a region never before traversed by white men. At the time when autumn was giving place to winter, without reliable guides or maps, they were to cross the deserts lying between them and the Rocky Mountains.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 47.--MAP OF A PORTION OF WESTERN NORTH AMERICA, MADE IN 1826

Showing the Buenaventura River]

They met with no great difficulties until they had gone as far south as Klamath Lake. "From this point," Fremont says, "our course was intended to be about southeast to a reported lake called Mary's, at some days' journey in the Great Basin, and thence, still on southeast to the reputed Buenaventura (good chance) River, which has had a place on so many maps, and countenanced the belief in the existence of a great river flowing from the Rocky Mountains to the Bay of San Francisco."

Figure 47 shows one of the maps to which Fremont refers. How interesting it is! Compare it with a good map in your geography and you will readily see that it is very misleading. The Sierra Nevada, one of the greatest mountain ranges in the United States, hardly appears, while traced directly across the map is the great Buenaventura River which Fremont expected to find and follow eastward toward its source near the Rocky Mountains.

If this river had really been where it was mapped, it is likely that Fremont would have had no trouble, for if hard pressed he could have followed the stream down to the ocean. But a wall of snow-covered mountains lying in the way made matters very different.

Winter was coming on when the party entered what is now northwestern Nevada, looking for the Buenaventura River. For several weeks they toiled on, often through the snow. Concerning this part of the journey Fremont says: "We had reached and run over the position where, according to the best maps in my possession, we should have found Mary's lake or river. We were evidently on the verge of the desert, and the country was so forbidding that we were afraid to enter it."

The party then turned south, still hoping that the river might be discovered. After a time they came upon a large lake and travelled for many miles along its eastern sh.o.r.e. One camp was made opposite a tall, pyramid-shaped island, the white surface of which made it conspicuous for a long distance. Fremont was much impressed by the resemblance of the island to the pyramids of Egypt and so named the body of water Pyramid Lake. At the southern end of the lake the travellers found a large stream flowing into it (now known as the Truckee River), and followed along its banks for some distance; but as the river turned toward the west, they left it and struck out across the country.

Fremont says again, "With every stream I now expected to see the great Buenaventura, and Carson (Kit Carson, the famous scout) hurried eagerly to search on every one we reached for beaver cuttings, which he always maintained we should find only on waters which ran to the Pacific."

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 48.--PYRAMID ISLAND, PYRAMID LAKE, NEVADA]

But all the streams flowed in the wrong direction, until at last the explorers grew weary of hunting for the river which had no existence.

Although it was the middle of the winter, Fremont determined to cross the lofty Sierras which rose like a white wall to the west.

Once over the mountains, he hoped to gain the American settlements in the Sacramento Valley, where already Sutter's Fort had been established.

The party ascended Walker River, dragging, with great difficulty, a howitzer which they had brought with them. The snows grew deeper as storm succeeded storm. Feeling that they were really lost, the disheartened men at length abandoned the gun, at a spot which has since been named Lost Canon.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 49.--LOST CAnON, EASTERN SLOPE OF THE SIERRA NEVADA MOUNTAINS]

When their own provisions were nearly gone, the party obtained some pine nuts and also several rabbits from the Indians. A dog which had been brought along made one good meal for the wayfarers.

An Indian who had been persuaded to act as guide pointed out the spot where two white men, one of whom was Walker, a noted frontiersman, had once crossed the mountains; but the guide made them understand that it was impossible to cross at that time of the year, saying, in his own language, "Rock upon rock, snow upon snow."

Although they could advance only by breaking paths through the snow, and were reduced to eating mule and horse flesh, yet the Fremont party pushed on. Finally they reached the summit of the mountains and turned down by the head of a stream flowing westward, which proved to be the American River. After three weeks more of terrible suffering they came out of the mountains at Sutter's Fort, where they obtained supplies and had an opportunity to rest and recruit.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 50.--FReMONT PEAK, MOHAVE DESERT]

Fremont now recognized the incorrectness of the maps which had so nearly caused the destruction of the party. As he says in his notes: "No river from the interior does, or can, cross the Sierra Nevada, itself more lofty than the Rocky Mountains... There is no opening from the Bay of San Francisco into the interior of the continent."

When the return journey was begun the party did not recross the high Sierras, but turned southward through the San Joaquin Valley and gained the Mohave Desert by the way of Tehachapai pa.s.s. The route now led eastward across the deserts and low mountain ranges of California and southern Nevada, until at last Great Salt Lake was reached.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 51.--SAGE-BRUSH IN THE GREAT BASIN]

Among the many geographical discoveries of the expedition was the demonstration of the existence of the Great Basin. In his report, Fremont, while speaking of its vast sterile valleys and of the Indians which inhabit them, says: "That it is peopled we know, but miserably and spa.r.s.ely ... dispersed in single families ...

eating seeds and insects, digging roots (hence their name) [Digger Indians], such is the condition of the greater part. Others are a degree higher and live in communities upon some lake or river from which they repulse the miserable Diggers.

"The rabbit is the largest animal known in this desert, its flesh affords a little meat.... The wild sage is their only wood, and here it is of extraordinary size--sometimes a foot in diameter and six or eight feet high. It serves for fuel, for building material, for shelter for the rabbits, and for some sort of covering for the feet and legs in cold weather. But I flatter myself that what is discovered, though not enough to satisfy curiosity, is sufficient to excite it, and that subsequent explorations will complete what has been commenced."

THE STORY OF GREAT SALT LAKE

The most interesting geographical feature of Utah is the Great Salt Lake. Few tourists now cross the continent without visiting the lake and taking a bath in its briny waters. This strange body of water has, however, been slowly growing smaller for some years, and probably will in time disappear. A study of the history of the lake may throw some light upon the important question of its possible disappearance, and it will certainly bring out many interesting facts.

We do not know with certainty who was the first white man to look upon this inland sea, although it is supposed to have been James Bridger, a noted trapper, who in 1825 followed Bear River down to its mouth. He tasted the water and found it salt, a fact which encouraged him in the belief that he had found an arm of the Pacific Ocean.

More than two hundred years ago there were vague ideas about a salt lake situated somewhere beyond the Rocky Mountains. In 1689 Baron Lahontan published an account of his travels from Mackinac to the Mississippi River and the region beyond. He states that he ascended a westerly branch of the river for six weeks, until the season became too late for farther progress. He reports meeting savages who said that one hundred and fifty leagues beyond there was a salt lake, "three hundred leagues in circ.u.mference--its mouth stretching a great way to the southward."

This imaginative story aroused interest in the West. In a book published in 1772, devoted to a description of the province La Louisiane, the possibility of water communication with the South Sea is discussed as follows: "It will be of great convenience to this country, if ever it becomes settled, that there is an easy communication therewith, and the South Sea, which lies between America and China, and that two ways: by the north branch of the great Yellow River, by the natives called the river of the 'Ma.s.sorites'

(Missouri), which hath a course of five hundred miles, navigable to its head, or springs, and which proceeds from a ridge of hills somewhat north of New Mexico, pa.s.sable by horse, foot, or wagon, in less than half a day. On the other side are rivers which run into a great lake that empties itself by another navigable river into the South Sea. The same may be said of the Meschaouay, up which our people have been, but not so far as the Baron Lahontan, who pa.s.sed on it above three hundred miles almost due west, and declares it comes from the same ridge of hills above mentioned, and that divers rivers from the other side soon make a large river, which enters into a vast lake, on which inhabit two or three great nations, much more populous and civilized than other Indians; and out of that lake a great river disembogues into the South Sea."

In 1776 Father Escalante travelled from Santa Fe far to the north and west. He met Indians who told him of a lake the waters of which produced a burning sensation when placed upon the skin. This was probably Great Salt Lake, but it is not thought that he himself ever saw it. The Escalante Desert, in southern Utah, once covered by the waters of the lake, is named after this explorer.

Nothing more seems to have been learned of the lake after its discovery by Bridger until in 1833 Bonneville, a daring leader among the trappers, organized a party for its exploration. Was.h.i.+ngton Irving, in his history of Captain Bonneville, says of the party, "A desert surrounded them and stretched to the southwest as far as the eye could reach, rivalling the deserts of Asia and Africa in sterility.

There was neither tree, nor herbage, nor spring, nor pool, nor running stream, nothing but parched wastes of sand, where horse and rider were in danger of peris.h.i.+ng."