File:The mystic mid-region, the deserts of the Southwest (1904) (14801587393).jpg

Identifier: mysticmidregiond00burd (find matches)
Title: The mystic mid-region, the deserts of the Southwest
Year: 1904 (1900s)
Authors: Burdick, Arthur J. (Arthur Jerome), 1858-
Subjects: Deserts Southwest, New -- Description and travel
Publisher: New York, London, G.P. Putnam's Sons
Contributing Library: New York Public Library
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

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othe itlea of convertino; a part of the waters ofthe Colorado into an irrigating canal for thepurpose of reclaiming the lands of the valle). CHAPTER XIII DEATH VALLEY OF the 157,000 square miles of territorywhich comprise the State of Cahfornia,35,000 square miles are desert. Of this areamore than two thousand square miles lie be-low the level of the sea. The lowest point inall this submarine field is found in DeathValley, the most terrifying and forbidding re-gion in the world. Death Valley has been rightly named. Itwas christened with blood and has ever livedup to its title. Sixty-eight out of the seventyMormon emigrants who wandered into thatdread region, in 1849, gave their lives to thechristening. The story of their terrible deathfrom tortures of thirst and agonies of heatis too horrible to print. They came into anameless region and their bodies were thereconsigned to unmarked graves. There lie to-day the remains of all that party save two.These two, when they came away, left 172
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Death Valley i75 behind them a region with a name—DeathValley. Since then other names have been given tolocalities within this terrible region, and theyhave been, for the most part, names in keep-ing with the awfIllness of the place. Tliemountains which tower above the fearful sink,shutting it off from the great desert outside,have been named Funeral Mountains.There is Furnace Creek, whose waters,bitter, poisonous, and unpalatable, flowingthrough burninor sands, become heated asthough literally flowing from a glowing fur-nace. There are Ash Meadows, a plainstrewn with scoriae debris—a Sodom of theWestern world. There is the DevilsChair, a gigantic and realistic throne wornby erosion from the huge bluffs which formthe portals to the valley, a seat appropriate tohis Satanic majesty were he to choose a throneupon earth. Indeed, according to a noticeposted by a Government surveying party inthe pass into the valley, the home of the chiefof imps is not far distant. The notice readsthus

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