Viewing page 70 of 97

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

30
Spokan R. to

[[left margin]] Columbian Basin &c [[\left margin]]  Crossing the Spokan River we entered immediately on the "Great Plain of the Columbia", which though the lowest part of the Basin drained by that river is yet from 500 to (200 feet above its level at Fort Okanagan) & Wallawalla.  It is in fact an elevated plateau - the summit of an immense Basaltic structure through some of whose immense cracks the Columbia has found a passage.  
[[left margin]] Soil [[\left margin]]  The soil is everywhere scanty, and the surface covered with fragments of rock.  
[[left margin]] Trees [[\left margin]]  In many places not a tree is visible over the entire horizon, & the few growing along the water courses are Poplars & or Willows with a few scattered Pines.  
[[left margin]] Shrubs [[\left margin]]Here also the Peculiar vegetation of the Central plains begins to prevail - the species of Astemisia Purshia &c being the same as those of the Yakima.
[[left margin]] Palouse Canon [[\left margin]]  The first running water met with after passing several small alkaline lakes is the Palouse River which flows through the most rugged and barren "Canon" seen on the journey, evidently a mere fissure of the rock and continuing to deepen & grow steeper until it suddenly ends at Snake or Lewis' Fork.

[[end page]]
[[start page]]

31
Ft. Wallawalla

Snake River where we struck it presents the same forbidding and useless appearance as most of the upper Columbia.
[[left margin]] Snake River Canon [[\left margin]]  Its narrow rocky canon is even more extensive than on that river, as far as known presenting no cultivatable regions or navigable waters for at least 300 miles above its mouth.
[[left margin]] Trees [[\left margin]]  Not a tree grows within a long distance and the only wood is what drifts down from its upper branches.
Ascending from the banks of Snake River, a remarkable & agreeable change is at once visible.
[[left margin]] Wallawalla valley [[\left margin]]  The rolling hills are covered by a luxuriant growth of grass, increasing as we approach Walla-walla valley.  Here again is an instance of the difference between the country on the Columbia & its affluents.  This river though small enough to be forded near its mouth has on its upper branches one of the most fertile tracts in the Columbia basin which as we descended it changed gradually into a [[strikethrough]] barren[[\strikethrough]] alkaline sandy & rocky district which at its mouth is the most barren & useless desert we met with, reminding me strongly of the deserts of Utah as described by Fremont.
[[left margin]] (P.23 B) Plants [[\left margin]]  Here I first saw Fremontia and some other species of plants of the desert.

Transcription Notes:
Spokan River is now spelled Spokane River