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Show APPROACHING THE GRAND CANON. 347 and many junipers, pines, and other trees among which I went about three leagues, I arrived at a ran-cheria which appertains to the Jabesua, whither had come some of this nation to gather the fruit of the juniper. The principal Indian offered himself to accompany me next day. June 26. I traveled four leagues southeast, and, south, and turning to the east; and halted at the sight of the most profound caxones which ever onward continue ( que cun todavia sigueri); and within these flows the Rio Colorado. There is seen ( vese) a very great sierra, which in the distance ( looks) blue; and there rims from southeast to northwest a pass open to the very base, as if the sierra were cut artificially to give entrance to the Rio Colorado into these lands. neither his courses nor his distances can be taken at the foot of the letter. He lost his compass in the Tulares of California, and merely guesses at the cardinal points as well as at the leagues made. The country over which he passes is almost as much of a howling wilderness to- day as it was in 1776; if we could trace his very footsteps we should be able to name very few places. We shall find him when he strikes the Grand canon, and again when he crosses the Colorado Chiquito, but that is about all. This first day he goes southeast up Cataract cation to the place indicated in note n, p. 344, where the old trail to Moqui takes up a side canon to his left. He seems to finish this side canon and camp at a scanty watering place, having made some northing. He is thus on the plateau, between Cataract Canon on his right and the Grand canon on his left. Approx. position lat. 35° 55', long. 1120 30'. |