The Austin weekly statesman. (Austin, Tex.) 1883-1898, 1894-06-07
REGION OF WONDERS.
SOME OF THE NATURAL MARVELS TO
BE SEEN IN OREGON.


Something Strange TO COme-In the Val.
ley of DesolatiOn.
Nowhere on the known globe is there
another region of the same extent repre-,
senting the weird and grewsOme as well
as the sublime and grand in nature as
in long and wide strip lying a consid-
cradle distance inland from the western
coast of the United States. Here can be
found an abundance of illustrations of
both the dead and living past-that
strange past Of physical violence proceed
ing the age of man, and that solemn
past when the forces had gone to rest
and the imprint of chaos lay everywhere
There are premonitions in abundance of
something strange to come in the coun-
ties of Snohomish, Okanogan, Douglas
and Yakima in Washington, but this is
not fully emphasized until the Oregon
counties Of Morrow, Gillian, Grant and
Lake have been considered, and the mar
velous receives wonderful accession in
the long line of eastern California coun-
ties, southern Nevada, a considerable
region in Utah west of Great Salt lake,
southern New Mexico and a region of
no small dimensions in northern Texas.
Here, to the mental and the ocular sight,
are unsolved problems in geology, para
doxes in physical formation and number
less instances of what may be termed in
versions of established geographical Or
der.
In Oregon we are confronted with the
still and silent Sagebrush desert, hem
med in by wildly picturesque yet as
dreary and inhospitable region as can
be found anywhere. In the midst of this
desert, as if to reflect the surrounding
awfulness, is Fossil lake, and all the
surrounding region is one vast and wide
cemetery of the fauna of a precataclysmal
world. Here are massed together more
fossil specimens of a greater variety Of
early animal life than can be found any
where on the earth, excepting the i'm
mense fossil islands northward of ST.
beria-horses of rare form, different spe-
cies of camels, llamas, mammoths, sloths
of huge proportions, wonderful birds, and
the evidence that primitive man at some
time was there is indicated by the pres
ence of arrowheads Clipped from vol
canic glass; But what long ages have
been entombed since these tropical ami
mails in their untamed strength tEod the
soil of Oregon and what mighty changes
have swept over the earth since thenl
How came they there in such amazing
numbers, and what were the causes of
such universal and evidently such 81
multaneous death? No conditions on
the earth as we know them now could
bring this about. Yet here nature chose
to locate one Of her remarkable mortua-
ry establishments and to enshroud it
with the gloom Of unrelieved desola-
ton. Commencing in this region and
extending down into California, the
mountains are freakish. They are not
constructed on the chain or continuous
system. The earth did not wrinkle her
crust, but she erupted into huge boils;
the peaks stand isolated, sometimes in
terrupting an otherwise comparatively
even plain.
And now the valleys, rivers and con-
siderable lakes take on habit of be-
coming lost. The streams, after consid-
cradle underground meandering, find
themselves again on the surface, and
after a succession of Temperatures and
disappearance either stay found or are
lost entirely.
Chasms, with almost mile of depth
and faced with perpendicular walls of
solid rock, now begin to appal both
sight and sense, and in Mariposa coun-
ty the tremendous canyon of the
Yosemite exceeds anything of the
kind on the earth. Before this hot
springs have become common, lakes of
soda water abound, and San Bernardino
has valleys where the soil is hot and
boiling geysers obtrude. Lava fields
covering immense tracts, have exhibited
vitrifed scori8 from northern Oregon
down, and Nye county, New, has lava
beds III profusion. In Inyo county, and
taking in a portion of San Bernardino
Death valley, grim, hot and repellent
presents itself, it and the surrounding
region constituting, not in the mind
only, but in reality, region bordering
more on the human conception of the
Internal than can be furnished by any
other locality on the globe.
In this valley of desolation the sum-
mer temperature reaches 40 degrees
rivaling that of the Sahara. 1t is some
hundreds of feet below sea level, en-
tirely destitute of water although the
Amagosa river discharges into one end
of it, and in the interior has an atmos-
phere as of burning sulphur that neither
human nor animal lungs can long in
hale without great risk to life. Embrac-
ing hundreds of square miles, it affords
not a sign of either animal or vegetable
life in its interior, while its furnacelike
heat renders it one of the hottest spots
on the globe. In the same system is So
da lake, into which the troubled Mohave
river finally enters, discharging its
bracllish waters as into q sieve. The
country abounds with sinks, streams
suddenly plunge into subterranean
depths farther south to furnish hot wa
I i