| OCR Text |
Show A NOTICE OF THE ANCIENT RUINS OF SOUTHWESTERN COLORADO, EXAMINED DURING THE SUMMER OF 1875. BY W. H. HOLMES. In addition to my duties as geologist to the southwest or San Juan division of the survey for 1875,1 was assigned the very agreeable task of making examinations of such ancient remains as might be included in the district surveyed. Much information had already been given to the public in relation to the ruius of Southwestern Colorado by Mr. Jackson, who paid them a short visit in 1874, and many similar remains had been described by early explorers in New Mexico and Arizona, but nothing like » complete sorve/ of this particular region had been made. The district examined by our party covers an area of nearly 6,000 square miles, chiefly in Colorado, but including narrow belts in the adjacent Territories of New Mexico, Utah, and Arizona. It lies wholly on the Pacific slope, and belongs almost entirely to the drainage- system of the Bio San Juan, a tributary of the Colorado of the West. Lying along the west base of the mountains is a comparatively flat country, the eastern border of the great plateau- region that reaches ' westward toward the Sierras. The surface- geology is chiefly Cretaceous, and the various large streams formed on the west slope of the Rocky Mountains have cut long cafioned valleys down through the nearly horizontal beds. Iu the greater part of this region, there is little moisture apart from these streams, ancf, as a consequence, vegetatiou is very sparse, and the general aspect of the country is that of a semi-desert. Tet there is bountiful evidence that at one time Unsupported a numerous population ; there is scarcely a square mile in the 6,000 examined that would not furnish evidence of occupation by a race totally distinct from the nomadic savages who hold it now, and in every way superior to them. At first, it seems strange that a country so dry and apparently barren could support even a moderate population, and it is consequently argued that the climate has grown less moist since the aucient occupation. Be this as it may, I observe the fact that the great bulk of remains are on, or in the immediate neighborhood of runniug streams, or by springs that furnish a plentiful supply of water during the greater part of the year. The ever- present pottery may in many cases have been broken and left by hunting and wandering parties, and the remnants of dwellings far ont from water may be but temporary abodes used only in the • inter or during rainy seasons. I also notice that the country is by no means an entire desert. All abng the stream- courses, there are grass- covered meadows and broad belts of alluvial bottom, affording, if properly utilized, a considerable area of rich tillable land. The ruins of this region, like most others of the extreme West and South, are the remnants in a great measure of stone structures. To |
