OCR Text |
Show The first complete survey of the Great bait Lake was made in 1849- 50 by Captain Howard Stansbury of the Topographical Engineers of the United States army. The report of his work was published by the government in 1852, and it has always been considered one of the outstanding documents on the topography of the Salt Lake Valley and Lake. In the company under Captain Stansbury were geologists, zoologists, and botanists, and the report of Professor James Hall on the geology and paleontology cf the country is a carefully prepared paper. A Mr. L. D. Gale made a chemical analysis of the waters which was fundamentally correct. Stansbury writes a virile description of the Valley and the richness of the soil. I quote a rather extensive paragraph from his report; Let us now look for a moment at the sources which can be made available for the sustenance of a population so numerous as it is thus confidently anticipated will ere long be congregated within the limits of the " Basin State". Situated so far inland, without water communication with any part of the continent, and isolated by the very nature of the surrounding regions, it will readily be seen that the new State must necessarily depend, in a great measure, for its support, upon means within itself. Agriculture and the raising of stock must therefore be the principal basis of its prosperity. For both these purposes the country which they have settled is, fortunately, well adapted. The land available for the first of these objects, though limited in extent when compared with the vast deserts which intervene, is still ample for the support of a large, though not very dense population. Owing to the almost total absence of rain, from May to October, the dependence of the farmer must be entirely upon irrigation. The means for this are supplied from the reservoirs of snow which accumulate in the gorges of the mountains, furnishing, during the whole of the summer, abundant and never- failing streams, which assume in some instances the character of rivers of considerable magnitude. The soil, formed chiefly from the disintegration of feldspathic rock, mixed with detritus of the limestone, of which the mountains are principally composed, is of the most fertile character. Owing to its loose and porous texture, it absorbs water very readily and in large quantities. Consequently the streams which come rushing down the mountain- sides, when they reach the plain below, begin to dwindle into insignia ficant rivulets, and soon sink and are entirely lost. Many never reach the base of the mountain at all, being absorbed by the soil; and even in the islands of the lake there are to be found, near the summits, roaring torrents, which are making half the descent of the mountains, so completely disappear as to leave not even a dry bed of channel to show they had ever reached the water below. Cultivation is therefore circumscribed within very narrow limits, being generally restricted to a strip of from one to two miles wide, along the base of the mountains, beyond which the water does not reach. The extensive plains between the mountain ranges, although composed of soil nearly equal in fertility, are at present useless for the purposes of agriculture, from the want of water. The smallness cf the area - 4 * |