Show the colorado desert where is ua it between parallels 32 and rid 31 degrees north latitude and the meridians and degrees west it is 19 in fact the southwestern comer corner of california its western bo andary boundary is the sierra its northern and eastern margins are formed by a spur or branch range of the sierra sierras starting from near mount san bernardino running easterly some forty mile sand thence bending southeasterly and southerly and falling failing away into the lower and lower hills until it flattens out into barren plains near fort yuma on the south it opens up through a gradual ascent upon the tile head of the gulf of california its width varies from thirty to forty miles and its average length is something over a hundred and twenty five miles what is it probably if not unquestionably it is the old bed or bottom of the gulf of california Calif ornu which once one extended at leasta least a undred hundred li and fifty miles northwesterly beyond its present limits its surface has a grad gradual ual ascent from the northerly end to tile tiie present sandy shore of the gulf its tempos temporary limit ina lna in a xer ver very y able ingenious and interesting inte ints resting article by dr J P widney of losi los angeles published in the overland mon monthly ably lor for J january aubary of the present year ho he thinks thao that tile the colorado entering the east side of the ancient gulf gull nearly a hundred and fifty miles above its head brought down dowil millions of tons of quicksand and thick red mud which gradual gradually lr formed an at immense shoal and in time a delta which after many any years stretched quite quito across to tha the e opposite shore of the gulf which was narrow ut at that placa place q this of course coure cuts oft the upper bundred hundred and fifty miles of tho tile guif gulf and and changed jt it inta a large bh allow lake Thi lake laUe receiving ra 01 afir rainfall rain fall nor rivers suni buni clent to lle ile rel rei place its loss fos by the evajo evaporation r w this extremely hot locality dried completely away and aud JV left 6 its sandy bed a desert desent basin this annual alluvial deposit has hns steadily increased thedis the distance tall tail b I 1 e tween the riverbed river bed and the tho th C sou ron them thern margin of or the old desert till it has for fon formed ed W ti neck neek 0 af pf f land nearly forty miles wide 46 j lying Y 11 but slightly above the sea i the taking n away of such an all immense body of water presenting over five thousand s square quare miles af surface constantly subjected to an extremely rapid evaporation must wila have made the climate and hotter forone for one or two hundred miles east or west thatis through southern caramia caralla cah CaR amia Amla and western ves yes ferll terri arizona that this is exactly what did take place on one bide aide at least western arizona furnishes two conclusive proofs 1 1 theoulus thet the ruins ulus of cities once large and populous and the remains of wide and deep canals for extensive systems of irrigation 2 remains of old forests evidently dead for wan wari of moisture if any one questions the modifying influence of evaporation upon climate let him consi consider cler the fact filet given in the published proceedings of the bombay geographical society that the annual evaporation of the bay of bengal is more than sixteen feet but this upper part of the old gulf of california flanked on both sides by high mountains whose steeply sloping sides daily reflected an amount of heat beat which greatly increased tile the evaporating power ower of the suns direct rays must eave have lost a proportion proportionately abely greater amount assuming however for the sake of a safe argument that its evaporation only equaled that of the bay of bengal wo we should have an amount of or vapor which if condensed and aad precipitated would supply twelve inches of rain over square miles an area more than double that of the entire state of ohio and more than half of the land surface of all california submerge the desert again make it once more the tile bottom of a vast lake an inland sea in fact sending up lip thousands thousands of tons of vapor every day cooling the overlying and surrounding air for hundreds of and thus causing the pree precipitation of a 1 large part of the vapor now held I 1 in suspension by the ocean winds this would restore not only tho the humidity but the mildness of those climatic cli ell matie matia conditions which once made fertile thousands of leagues u s now desert for more than a hundred years but which under tile tiie restoration of former con conditions 1 d mi might 0 lit and would budana bud and aud b blossom 1 again as surely as causa cause produces etl eti effect act the dampness of f the atmosphere thus increased and the lower temperature pera ture thus secured would have yet another and most beneficial effect they would retard and diminish the evaporation of the rains which do fall and the greater ral rai rain n which would fall over the adjacent country this would work three good results 1 A milder climate 2 A moister so soil 3 more springs and streams I 1 I liow ilow how could the presen present t desert be flooded again in either cither one of two ways 1 by ayac a canal from the tho present head I 1 of the gulf across the forty miles of sand which now separates the present head of the gulf from its old bed which is now the desert this would be extremely difficult and costly if it not impracticable not only on account of tho the great length and width required but on account of the tho constant sand drift which would continually tend to fill the tho canal again then too tile the action of the river and gulf waves would tend to obstruct tile the gulf end of tile the canal and to increase the tho width of tile tiie sandy belt or isthmus limus across which it would bo be cut this plan would restore the tho desert to its old oli condition of a salt W water ater lake lako it has been often suggested and strongly advocated 2 open a canal from tapi colo r ado rado river iriti tild the river antii baert and thus make W it a freshwater r lake wic during the flood season of tho jast jait la jai A t verity twenty ti years tile the rayer has been beer doing 4 this itself this natural annual overflow already forms a stream a h yards wide and four feet deen deep with a atton strong 1 1 current which pours pau 4 0 0 6 wp water wafer t r into the tho desert as I 1 to maka make a lake several ma actus aci act oss but sp SO shallow that it lt dries up in ja a 4 few weeks after the subsidence ot tile the floods in the main river niver cuts u ts pa Us Is supply i little artificial help heip elp would turn vie tho choto of tho colorado liuto litto this dew new channel which would presently deepen so as to remain permanent 3 combine combino tha tho two pro projects jetts open the tho canal canan from both the gulf landl landd tho the river riven mlis tins tina would insure an amp leand aud and nud speedy fillin filling of the with a flood hood which ithe tile river supply Rupp lr would const natly tend to keep afta atta le level levei vela a little above that of tile tild guil gulf thu creating a current through tj I 1 to canal to deepen d widen and andr nake nako it wore more permanent all tho thophile while a na I 1 believe belleve irwill it will bo be eor for greatel greater antimore and anti more costly thin things hayo been bean done long to 1 at it is ig fhe the gnand grand climatic problem on whose solution depe depends ads the tho population kopul atlon and the civilization of millions of the tho most fertil fertile e acres of western arizona and southern california those who wish fuller statements 0 of f most of the tho ideas here hurriedly condensed may nind find them in dr widness Wid articie article already cited and who do so will unite in the question with which lie closes would ib it be money wasted if the govern ment were wele to send a commission of scientific men of engineers engineers carefully to examine the subject to run levels anti and report the result san guardian Cu ardian ardlan |