ssissippi River to the Pacific Ocean. The
pass desired was the Guadaloupe Canon, used as a wagon road by General
Cook in his march from New Mexico to California in 1846, and strange to
say, not subsequently occupied as a railroad pass.

The country south of the new boundary line is not of much consequence
to us: it belongs to Mexico.

The country north of the Mexican boundary is the most marvelous in the
United States. After many years of arduous investigation and comparison
with all the other countries of the world, it is still nearly as great
an enigma as when first explored in 1854. The valleys are as fair as the
sun ever shone upon, with soil as productive as the valley of the Nile.
The rigors of winter never disturb agricultural pursuits in the open. In
fact, in the southern portion of the territory there is no winter.

The valleys of Arizona are not surpassed for fertility and beauty by any
that I have seen, and that includes the whole world; but still they are
not occupied. Spanish and Mexican grants have hung over the country like
a cloud, and settlers could not be certain of a clear title. Moreover,
the Apaches have been a continual source of dread and danger. This state
of affairs is, however, now passing away.

There were evidences of a recent Mexican occupation, with the ruins of
towns, missions, presidios, haciendas, and ranches. There were evidences
of former Spanish civilization, with extensive workings in mines. There
were evidences of a still more remote and mysterious civilization by an
aboriginal race, of which we know nothing, and can learn but little by
the vestiges they have left upon earth.

They constructed houses, lived in communities, congregated in cities,
built fortresses, and cultivated the soil by irrigation. No evidence has
been found that they used any domestic animals, no relic of wheeled
vehicles, neither iron, steel, nor copper implements; and yet they built
houses more than five stories high, and cut joists with stone axes.

How they transported timbers for houses is not known. The engineering
for their irrigating canals was as perfect as that practiced on the
Euphrates, the Ganges, or the Nile. The ruins of the great houses (casas
grandes) are precisely with the cardinal points.

Near Florence, on the Gila, is beyond all doubt the oldest and most
unique edifice in the United States. Just when and how it was built
baffles human curiosity. Whether it was erected for a temple, a p