The mirror., 1922-03-02
THE LOWER COLORADO

ana ltS grandeur, is llttle CdlCulateQ 10
raise practical thoughts in the minds of
most of its beholders. But anyone with a
touch of the engineer in his makeup who
gazes into this great chasm must marvel at
the tremendous energy that has been ex-
erted by running water in carving its way
more than a mile in depth through rocks
of various degrees of hardness. And into
his mind, as his eye gauges the vast can
yon, is sure to come the question: What
has become of the billions of cubic yards
of material that once filled this enormous
pit? The lower Colorado country-a re-
gion of fascination despite its deserts and
marshes, its mud volcanoes and shifting
sand d-dunes--is the answer; for it is truly
the creature of the river, built from the
countless tiny grains of sand and silt that
its waters have brought down through the
centuries.
The mouth of the Colorado is one of the
least-known regions of North America.
Only so miles to the north in an air line
the American town of Yuma has existed
for the better part of a century, and
through it passes one of the principal
transcontinental railroads of the United
States; while little more than hundred
miles to the west lies the rich valley of
southern California and the coast cities
with teeming populations.
There are physical difficulties in reach
ing the mouth of the Colorado; but the
chief impediment is an imaginary line
the Mexican border. For while the COL
orado is essentially river of the United
States, and traverses its soil for some nine
teen-twentieths of its length, for the last
IS miles before it reaches the sea its banks
are formed by Mexican territory. And to
add to the isolation the sea which the
Colorado reaches is the long narrow Gulf
of California, whose northern end, into
which the Colorado pours, is bounded by
desert sands and rocky, largely barren
mountains. For 200 miles or more below
the mouth of the Colorado, the shores of
the gulf form desolate region, almost the
only permanent inhabitants of which are
half-civilized Indians.
The Colorado may be compared in one
way to the Nile, since for hundreds of
miles both flow through desert regions
practically without tributaries. Above
Yuma, before reclamation work was un-
dertaken, the suddenness with which one
travelling in the desert would stumble upon
the river at almost any point along its
course was continuous source of wonder.
One of the striking features of the lower
Colorado country is just northwest of the
river, opposite Yuma, where is to be found
one of Americas closest approaches toward
duplicating the Sahara. This stretch of
country is given over to dunes built of
windswept sands brought down by the
river and washed by the rare torrential
rains from the adjacent hills. "A series of
long, sinuous ridges with sharp crests,
constantly travelling back and forth as the
wind shifts their tiny units, this dazzling
waste of sand needs only camel on some
summit to have all the atmosphere of the
Sahara.
Not only has the Colorado created
deserts; it has made what may be con-
sidered their opposites, marshes, as we'll.
Below Yuma, where the river emerges
from the rough country, the Colorado delta
stretches away to the sea, almost entirely
in Mexico. The stream does not flow in
one channel on this last lap of its journey,
but divides into numerous branches and
spreads over wide, nearly level area,
especially in food season. Between the
streamlets are extensive marshes grown up
in cat-tails, with willows lining the chan
nels. Halfway to the sea the many streams
meet in lake which serves as settling
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