The Arizona sentinel. [volume] (Arizona City [Yuma], Yuma County, A.T. [Ariz.]) 1872-1911, 1878-11-09
The Heart OF Arizona.

tAtutc VI lluluCI diIU 'ciuUclllSHctt
chiefly by thOrns and cacti, it will
be pleasant surprise to hear of
the great variety and beauty of
timber and vegetation found in
those parts of the Territory which
are blessed by copious rainfall.
One of the most attractive of these
parts is that lying between Verde
and Apache and at the southern
edge of the great pine-clad M0go-
Homes Mesa. This mesa underlies
apine forest of considerable width
and several hundred miles long.
Its pines appeared to us to be of
SOME variety between yellow and
sugar pine; the wood is soft and
splits well into very fair shakes;
they are of as fine a growth as any
pines we ever saw "down East"
On the mesa and south of it are
found frs eight feet in diameter,
magnificent trees; quaking poplar
(asp), in moist places, eighteen
inches to two feet through, rum
ming up eighty and one hundred
feet without limb, straight as an
arrow and with bark as white as
If painted; regular white oak of
considerable size, OF fine bole and
lovely foliage; Ernory's oak, a
dark evergreen peculiar to Arizo-
ma and differing from the live oak
of California, ON whose lower To-
liage horses are particularly fond
of browsing, and which is quite
familiar TO every one who has
traversed the country south of
Tucson; juniper trees like those
near Prescott, but larger, with
trunks five feet through and lots
of them three feet through, and
running up many feet without a
branch, all the year Around drop
ping berries ON which hogs keep
fat as they do at Houdon's ranch
in Spring Valley in this country
we are writing about; fine black
walnuts, under one of which as
much as four grain sacks full of
nuts have been gathered, with
their graceful light green young
fronds and aromatic odor; syca-
mores, cottonwoOds and willows
along the creeks, that would be
subjects for exhibition in any
other country; the regular New
England rock, or sugar.maple,
from which sugar will be made
and sold this coming Spring by
Yankees, who know what the
tree is, and who do not despise
trifles or labor; red eedars two
feet through and running up ten
or twelve feet without a branch,
enough to make cigar boxes for
the whole country; white ash two
feet through and with faultless
trunks for thirty. feet from the
ground. Such are some of the
trees found in that benny part of
Arizona. Wild fruits are album
dant, but are chiefly berries. Cur
rants of about the size of Isabella
grapes grow there like goose
berries, but thornless. June is
the month for strawberries. In
July come raspberries thicker
than they grow in Michigan and
thick enough to give a red tinge
to the shrubbery seen at little
distance. Wild grapes are album
dant but of little value. Wild
hops make perfect jungle of the
spots they love, and add much to
the charming appearance of that
country. This section of Arizona
is now being settled, as it would
have been years ago but for the
tenacity with which the Apaches
fought to hold it. What it is now
yielding to the efforts of human
industry we shall hereafter try to
present clearly to our readers; and
with such evidence as must si-
lence the scoffeKs at Arizona.
Things At the Front.
4 walk out to the railroad front