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Show 87 erence is made to their reports for description. It is, however, to be remarked that, since the southern continuation of the Sangre de Cristo range holds snow throughout the year, and its summits and slopes are less steep and consequently averaging more high land, and therefore less affected by the heated air of the San Luis Valley and the plains to the eastward, and less rapidly drained also, the streams which flow down their slopes are more constant, and, instead of soon sinking in the sand and volcanic dtbriss of the valley, reach the Rio Grande on the surface. The character of the b mnding ridge west of the San Luis Valley is altogether different from that just described. Although a component part of the Atlantic and Pacific divide, the part facing and bounding the San Luis Valley is not imposing from its great height, and is remarkable only for the lack of marked points. Dne west of the Pnncha Pass, the massive and peaked Saguache range ends at Mouut Antoro, a rounded trachytic mass about 13,450 feet in height. The divide from this point trends to the westward, with rounded, wooded hills, for some 15 miles, and then tarns to the southwest around the heads of the Saguache for 40 miles; then, making the remarkable tongue- like loup about the headwaters of the Rio Grande, again continues its course to the southwest, on the western border of San Luis Valley, below Del Norte. That portion of this divide seen from the San Luis Valley is an extensive trachytic overflow, of a plateau rather than a mountain character, cut by streams which flow in cations df greater or less width, sometimes inclosing within their walls beautiful little valleys and parks, heavily grassed and well wooded, at other points narrow and gorge-like impassable box cafions, its summit covered here with pifions, there by groves of pines, spruce, and quaking- aspen, and again by long, sweeping, rolling stretches, bounded perhaps by vertical ledges of trap, but beautifully and luxuriantly grassed, affording now shelter and pasturage for numerous deer and few elk, and iu future destined to be, like the Arkansas plateau, the summer range of more domestic cattle. The few mountains deserving the name in this portion of the San Luis Valley rim are rounded, wooded, dome- like masses, seldom rising above timber- line, save near the heads of La Garita and Carnero, where they attain considerable height. That portion of this overflow between the headwaters of the Saguache and the San Luis Valley is cut np by the drainage- lines and cations of the streams into numerous little hills and limited benches, which, though presenting from the valley the gently- sloping and • weeping outlines characteristic of such formations, offer serious difficulties to travel by frequent almost vertical bluffs and many ascents and descents along any given line. ** The streams rising in this broken plateau north of the Rio Grande and flowing into the San Luis Valley si uk in the sand or swell the volume of the San Luis swamp. South of Del Norte, the Conejos and Alamosa, which rise far back in the Sierra San J nan, invisible from the valley, reach the Rio Grande on the surface; others, as the Piedra Pintada and La Jara and Rito San Francisco, sink in the gravel. From the head of the San Luis Valley, looking south, the view is similar to what is seen in the dryer valleys of the great basin; the Sangre de Cristo range upon the eastr • rn border; the broad expanse of plain, with the rounded summits of the Cerro de las Utas and the Cerro San Antonio just appearing above the horizon or lifted by the mirage, together with the flat- topped aud limited basaltic mesas between them, far into the air; the cerritos, or little hills of lava, about the gate- way of the Rio Grande at Del Norte quivering through the vibrating air; the glaring white sand- hills, with their wavy crests and outlines piled in front of the Mosca Pass, all suggest the Great Basin rather than the region of the Rocky Mountains. The surface of the San Luis Valley is very interesting and quite varied in its characteristics. In the northern end, San Luis Creek, and Kerber Creek, its tributary, and Saguache Creek, a large mountain- stream, flow out into the center, and, here uniting ana spreading out over the flat surface, give rise\ to the San Luis swamp. It is a swamp, properly speaking, only for 8 or 10 miles; but there is a succession of pools and small lakes of slightly alkaline water and covered with myriads of water- fowl near the eastern edge of the valley, from about 5 miles below Saguache, and in certain seasons from Saguache as far as to the month of the Mosca Pass. In the northern portion of the area covered by this swamp, where quite extensive tracts are kept constantly wet, there is a most luxuriant growth of swamp- grass and sedges. White- tail deer abound, and large herds of cattle find sustenance in these sedges and grasses. These are cut quite extensively for hay, and are said to be valuable for that purpose. Certainly some use other than is now made of this abnndant material will be found. The cattle seem hardly to make an impression upon it; it grows to the height of a man's waist, is very thick and heavy upon the ground, and covers a large area. From the commencement of the swamp far up into the cafion of the Saguache, or for about 20 miles of its course, it is bordered by the richest of soils, producing most abundant crops of wheat, oats, and vegetables, and is by far the most inviting agricultural region of the valley. In the caiion of Saguache, the bottom- lands, as far as the bend of this stream, easily irrigated at slight expense, will average one- fourth of a mile in |