Canyons of the Colorado | Page 9

On the northeast side of the Little Colorado a great mesa country
stretches far to the northward. These mesas are but minor plateaus that
are separated by canyons and canyon valleys, and sometimes by low
sage plains. They rise from a few hundred to 2,000 or 3,000 feet above
the lowlands on which they are founded. The distinction between
plateaus and mesas is vague; in fact, in local usage the term mesa is
usually applied to all of these tables which do not carry volcanic
mountains. The mesas are carved out of platforms of horizontal or
nearly horizontal rocks by perennial or intermittent streams, and as the

climate is exceedingly arid most of the streams flow only during
seasons of rain, and for the greater part of the year they are dry arroyos.
Many of the longer channels are dry for long periods. Some of them are
opened only by floods that come ten or twenty years apart.
The region is also characterized by many buttes. These are plateaus or
mesas of still smaller dimensions in horizontal distance, though their
altitude may be hundreds or thousands of feet. Like the mesas and
plateaus, they sometimes form very conspicuous features of a
landscape and are of marvelous beauty by reason of their sculptured
escarpments. Below they are often buttressed on a magnificent scale.
Softer beds give rise to a vertical structure of buttresses and columns,
while the harder strata appear in great horizontal lines, suggesting
architectural entablature. Then the strata of which these buttes are
composed are of many vivid colors; so color and form unite in
producing architectural effects, and the buttes often appear like
Cyclopean temples.
There is yet one other peculiarity of this landscape deserving mention
here. Before the present valleys and canyons were carved and the
mesas lifted in relief, the region was one of great volcanic activity. In
various places vents were formed and floods of lava poured in sheets
over the land. Then for a time volcanic action ceased, and rains and
rivers carved out the valleys and left the mesas and mountains standing.
These same agencies carried away the lava beds that spread over the
lands. But wherever there was a lava vent it was filled with molten
matter, which on cooling was harder than the sandstones and marls
through which it penetrated. The chimney to the region of fire below
was thus filled with a black rock which yielded more slowly to the
disintegrating agencies of weather, and so black rocks rise up from
mesas on every hand. These are known as volcanic necks, and, being of
a somber color, in great contrast with the vividly colored rocks from
which they rise and by which they are surrounded, they lend a strange
aspect to the landscape. Besides these necks, there are a few volcanic
mountains that tower over all the landscape and gather about
themselves the clouds of heaven. Mount Taylor, which stands over the
divide on the drainage of the Rio Grande del Norte, is one of the most
imposing of the dead volcanoes of this region. Still later eruptions of
lava are found here and there, and in the present valleys and canyons

sheets of black basalt are often found. These are known as coulees, and
sometimes from these coulees cinder cones arise.
This valley of the Little Colorado is also the site of many ruins, and the
villages or towns found in such profusion were of mueh larger size than
those on the San Francisco Plateau. Some of the pueblo-building
peoples yet remain. The Zuni Indians still occupy their homes, and they
prove to be a most interesting people. They have cultivated the soil
from time immemorial. They build their houses of stone and line them
with plaster; and they have many interesting arts, being skilled potters
and deft weavers. The seasons are about equally divided between labor,
worship, and play.
A hundred miles to the northwest of the Zuni pueblo are the seven
pueblos of Tusayan: Oraibi, Shumopavi, Shupaulovi, Mashongnavi,
Sichumovi, Walpi, and llano. These towns are built on high cliffs. The
people speak a language radically different from that of the Zuni, but,
with the exception of that of the inhabitants of Hano, closely allied to
that of the Utes. The people of Hano are Tewans, whose ancestors
moved from the Rio Grande to Tusayan during the great Pueblo revolt
against Spanish authority in 1680-96.
Between the Little Colorado and the Rio San Juan there is a vast
system of plateaus, mesas, and buttes, volcanic mountains, volcanic
cones, and volcanic cinder cones. Some of the plateaus are forest-clad
and have perennial waters and are gemmed with lakelets. The mesas
are sometimes treeless, but are often covered with low, straggling,
gnarled cedars and pifions, trees that are intermediate in size between