USA > Texas > A comprehensive history of Texas, 1685-1897 > Part 8
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The Basin Region .- The Basin Region of the northern portion of the State consists of four distinct denuded areas separated by remnantal strips of their former coverings. The area extends from the foot of the Grand Prairie and Granite High- lands on the east and south to the Guadalupe Mountains on the west and the Wichita Mountains on the north.
The area is first divided into a northern and southern portion by the line of cretaceous-capped hills, buttes, and mesas south of the Texas and Pacific Railway, and the northern portion is again subdivided by a strip of materials of later age than
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the Llano Estacado beds. The southern subdivision touches the granite highlands on the southeast, and stretching westward joins the western portion of the northern division in Mitchell County. West of the Llano Estacado another denuded area, similar to that just east of the plains, is found between the scarp and the Guadalupe Mountains. It is the valley of the Pecos River. The general elevation northwest- ward is very gradual, being only twelve to fifteen hundred feet in the entire distance of over two hundred miles. In these divisions are distinct classes of topography for each of the various rock systems which are represented,-carboniferous, permian, triassic, and cretaceous. There can be little doubt that the lower cretaceous at one time covered the entire region, and in many places in the carboniferous area it is so lately worn away that the present land surface is approximately that which was originally engulfed by the cretaceous sea, the original contours of which have been preserved throughout the intervening time by this rock mantle. These ancient rounded forms, representing a very advanced stage of erosion, differ from the topog- raphy which is the resultant of the present erosion on the same beds. This latter has been often described as resembling steps, with the rise on the eastern face and. the tread dipping gently to the northwest. This is caused by the alternations of the limestones and clays, the latter of which, being more easily eroded, are more rapidly cut away, letting the fragments of the overhanging limestones fall in great masses over the incline. Thus, passing northwestward, an alternation or succession of scarps of greater or less; height must be crossed, running in a northeast and southwest direction with nearly level ground between. This general step-like expression is, however, so interrupted, cut through, and modified by drainage channels that a hilly country is the outcome. This is especially the case in the coal measures, where a series of high hills and deep valleys results, as at Canyon, or flat-topped hills and level valleys between, as in the counties of Stephens and Young. When the red beds of the permian are reached a more level country is found, and one for the most part with rounded contours by reason of the prevailing clayey nature of the beds. The few hills which interrupt the undulating plains are usually capped with gypsum and are but of moderate height, the only prominent elevations being the cretaceous- capped buttes and mesas. These begin with Double Mountain, in Stonewall County, and extend westward to the Llano Estacado. They rise five to six hundred feet above the general level, and in their immediate vicinity canyons have been cut so deep that they cannot be crossed except under the most favorable circumstances. As the Llano Estacado is approached and the gypsum and clays of the permian give place to the conglomerate and sands of the triassic, a sharper topography is found, and the hills, although not very high, are steep-sided.
The Seymour Plateau .-- This plateau, of very recent origin, varying in width from sixteen to fifty miles, stretches northwest from the Texas and Pacific Railway west of Sweetwater to the Red River north of Vernon. It has a length of one hundred and sixty miles. It is bounded on the west by a range of gypsum hills, and its elevation varies from twelve to sixteen hundred feet. This level plain, once a continuous plateau throughout its entire length, has been cut through by many streams, and their beds are now in some cases one hundred and fifty feet below its upper surface. Nevertheless, despite these interruptions, its general flat- ness of surface is still well preserved.
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The Llano Estacado .- This great plateau-the Stockaded Plain, as Pro- fessor Dana Anglicizes its Spanish name-occupies the greater portion of the western half of what is known as the Panhandle. Steep escarpments, whose wall- like faces rise in height from one hundred and fifty to four hundred feet, bound it on the east, north, and west. On the south its boundary is not so well defined, as it descends gradually until it merges into the plateau country. In its present extent it is but the remnant of a much greater area which reached from its present southern boundary far to the northward, probably connecting with the plains of Kansas and Nebraska, and from the Guadalupe Mountains on the west an unknown distance to the east. In origin it is closely akin to the lake-basins of the trans-Pecos Mountain system. Its outline is very irregular, but its greatest length and greatest breadth are each about two hundred miles. It is one vast plain with a gentle inclination from northwest to southeast, the elevation of the northwestern point being four thousand five hundred feet, while at the southeastern corner it is only two thousand eight hun- dred feet. So level is it that one standing on its surface seems to be in the midst of a great bowl whose gently sloping sides rise up to meet the overarching sky. Its continuity is, however, broken by canyons of greater or less extent, and its surface is dotted with lakes, several of which are permanent, some containing fresh water, while others are salt.
In the southwest the general level is broken by a few sand hills, which change their position with every wind. On the eastern side great canyons penetrate into the plains for longer or shorter distances. All of the canyons have flowing streamns in them, but usually the walls are so steep and precipitous that it is impossible to cross them even on horseback. Even the ascent to the top of the plains from the lower ground around them can be made at comparatively few points.
The Granite Highlands .- Lying at the point of junction of the Fort Worth and plateau divisions of the Grand Prairie, and at the time of the deposition of those divisions a land area which was not covered by the lower members of the Grand Prairie, are the Granite Highlands of Burnet and Llano Counties, with their fringe of paleozoic rocks. In extent they cover about three thousand square miles, and to the east, south, and west are completely surrounded by the Grand Prairie, and even along the northern border remnantal patches of similar deposits are found. In elevation these highlands vary from seven to eighteen hundred feet, and, as has already been stated, formed the starting-point or core of our entire land area. While it is comparatively small in extent, this granite highland has a topography as complex as its rock materials are diverse. The granitic rocks occur as a series of plateaux extending from Burnet County, on the east, westward through Llano into Mason. Bare, rounded peaks of similar rocks, such as Niggerhead Peak, in Bur- net County, and the King Mountains, in Llano, form a separated and irregular cordon along the flanks of these plateaux, while peaks of later date are found along the outer borders of the older beds and are partly covered with still newer rocks. Where these latter rocks, the cambrian, form the surface, they break down in bold and picturesque cliffs, as on Sandy Creek in Llano County and elsewhere. Sur- rounding these sandy beds of the cambrian are the silurian limestones in more rounded contours, forming the outer fringe of the region, which for picturesqueness is unexcelled by any in the State. In many parts it is fairly well timbered with
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oaks and pecan, and during the spring its scattered prairies are carpeted with flowers.
The Wichita Mountains .- The western terminus of the Wichita Mountains is all that touches Texas. Here a few scattered peaks of granite stand witness to the former extent of a mountain range of early times, which had close affinities with the granitic highlands of the Central Mineral Region, as shown by the similar rocks composing it, and by the parallelism of the disturbances which have operated on it. Eastward, in the Indian Territory, these granites are flanked by silurian limestones and form a more connected range.
Trans-Pecos Mountains .- Far-stretching plains, in whose immensity ordi- nary differences of elevation are so dwarfed as to make little impression against the general flatness ; here, a sharp peak or rounded summit, rising solitary from the boundless plain ; there, a mountain mass of rock, flat-topped, steep-sided, deep- canyoned, gray, and bare ; on this hand, a cluster of peaks, whose jagged tops accentuate their deeply ravined sides ; on that, low ridges, one face rising so sheer as almost to preclude their ascent, the other descending in a gentle slope ; here, a range with granite core, making brave front against the plain, but soon lost in the all-surrounding level, which here and there and everywhere sweeps round and through the hills and mountains, covering and hiding all connections and masking their true relations, until they seem indeed "mountains buried to their knees" in seas of sand. Such is the area of mountains and lake-basins which occupies two- thirds of the entire trans-Pecos region, extending along the Rio Grande from the New Mexico line to the great bend, -a distance of two hundred and fifty miles, with an average breadth of eighty miles. The mountains are spurs of the Rocky Moun- tain range (or are the result of the same mountain-building forces which formed that range), which, dividing in New Mexico, crosses Texas in four distinct lines or axes of elevation. The most prominent of these is the eastern, which, in a general way, may be said to form the divide between the Pecos and the Rio Grande. The western spur has a very small extension in Texas, while the two intermediate ones are somewhat lower than the Guadalupe Mountains to the east. In addition to the general slope from the divide east and west towards the rivers, the level of the country as a whole also descends towards the south, the general elevation towards the Rio Grande being one thousand fect or more lower than in the northern portion of the region. Therefore, while the relative height of the mountains above the plains may be the same in both sections, the actual elevations of the more northern of them will be the greater.
Along the two railroad lines which cross the region traversing the flats, the elevations vary from three thousand six hundred to four thousand six hundred feet, and exceed this only on the divide. The peaks and mountain masses rise to a height of fifteen hundred to two thousand feet, or even more, above this general level. 'The average direction of these major axes of elevation is from northwest to southeast, and the different ranges and clusters of mountains grouped by their re- lations to these are the Franklin Mountains, which are the southern continuation of the Organ Mountains ; the Hueco, Quitman, and Eagle Mountains ; the Comanche, Wind, Diabolo, Carrizo, Van Horn, Viejo, and Chinati Mountains ; the Guadalupe, Limpia or Davis, and Maravillas or Santiago Mountains.
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This grouping, while given for convenience of description, does not include all the elevations of the region, for, in addition to these, there are single peaks or clus- ters (occupying intermediate positions or cross-trends), especially in the southern part of the area. Rounded hills, flat-topped mesas, and sharp-crested ridges of cretaceous rocks are also scattered here and there through the plain as elevations which, although of less height than the ranges proper, are, nevertheless, greater than those of prominences dignified by the name of mountains in other portions of the State. The Franklin range, lying directly nortli of El Paso, contains peaks which rise nearly three thousand feet above that city. The mountains are com- posed of granite and porphyries, capped and flanked by limestones of various ages. Between these mountains and the Hueco range to the east lies the broad Lanoria Mesa. The mountain cluster known as the Hueco lies partly in New Mexico and partly in Texas. On its western side are located the Hueco tanks or springs and it is continued by hills of less elevation, with frequent interruptions of level ground, southeastward to the Quitmans, which have their beginning just south of the Southern Pacific Railway line a few miles west of Sierra Blanca. Lying across the track to the north of this point are four peaks, the principal one of which rises fully two thousand feet above the plain. Composed of quartzitic materials, the white color of the Sierra Blanca Mountains, as they are called, is streaked by red- brown only in the deep ravines that score their sides. They are supposed to be the result of the intrusion between the strata of a great body of basalt or other eruptive rock, which has lifted the upper beds to their present position. The Quit- man Mountains consist of two ranges, separated by a narrow valley looking north. The range nearest the railroad, which is much the smaller, is composed almost en- tirely of granitic rocks whose rugged peaks rise fifteen to seventeen hundred feet above the valley, but the more western one, while in its more northern part corre- sponding to its companion range, contains more porphyritic and basaltic material towards the southeast, and these are finally succeeded by limestones.
The Eagle Mountains, which are also in this trend, are peaks of porphyry thrust skyward through beds of limestone and clays of the carboniferous and cre- taccous age. Between them and the north range of the Quitmans are several ridges of cretaceous rock, sometimes as much as five hundred feet in height. At the foot of the Eagle Mountains, on the northern side, are the Eagle Springs, for many years a stage stand and the scene of many conflicts with the Indians. It is now the watering-place for hundreds of cattle.
The third range, beginning with the Cornudas and Wind Mountains in New Mexico, finds its southern continuation in the Sierra Pricta and Diabolo Mountains, with a great escarpment facing eastward, but whose slope to the west, while rough and broken, is nevertheless more gradual. About eight miles north of the Texas and Pacific Railroad the main body of the Diabolo Mountains ends in an escarpment, many parts of which are almost perpendicular. This portion of the mountains is composed of 'a red grit or sandstone, capped by limestones of carboniferous age, cut through in places by dykes and sheets of basalt and porphyry, while hundreds of feet below, in the flat to the south, are low hills and ridges of cretaceous rocks. A bluff, forming the southern termination of a spur of this range and very similar to it in composition, faces the Texas and Pacific Railroad near Eagle Flat Station,
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CAMBRIAN CLIFFS-SANDY WATER-GAP, LLANO COUNTY.
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and in the schistose materials which underlie it is the connection between the Diabolo and the Carrizo Mountains to the south.
The last-named mountains are largely made up of such schistose material flanked by limestones, and are connected in a general way with the Chinatis, some seventy miles southeast. In the Van Horn Mountains, which are part of this con- nection, not only the older granitic and schistose materials are met, but newer eruptions as well. These are followed by the later ridges known as Viejo or Rim Rock Mountains and their continuation, which are composed of cretaceous rocks sloping gently upward from the east, capped with eruptive material to a depth of three hundred feet, and having almost vertical cliffs facing the Rio Grande. In the Chinati Mountains are again seen the carboniferous limestones accompanied by granites and other eruptive rocks. As a rule, the elevations along this axis are not so great above the general level as those of the others.
The Guadalupe Mountains begin in southern New Mexico in a low ridge, and increase both in height and width as they stretch southeastward, until they find their culmination in Guadalupe Peak, which rises three thousand feet above the valley at its base, two thousand feet of that height being a sheer precipice. This is probably the highest point in the State, being something over eight thousand feet above the sea. These mountains are composed almost altogether of carboniferous sandstones and limestones, and on their western side present a precipitous escarp- ment facing that of the Diabolo to the southwest. The eastern side of the moun- tains slopes more gradually towards the valley of the Pecos, and is cut by many deep and tortuous canyons. South of the peak the range is continued by foot-hills of carboniferous or permian limestone, their bluffs still facing westward, to the Texas and Pacific Railroad near Kent, where they are succeeded by lower hills composed of cretaceous rocks.
The Limpia or Davis Mountains cover an area about forty miles in length by thirty in width, between the Texas and Pacific and Southern Pacific Railways. They are largely composed of granite, porphyritic and volcanic rocks, forming high peaks, like Gomez Peak at the northeastern corner ; ranges with serrated tops, as the Saw-Tooth Mountains ; steep, perpendicular cliffs, as in the vicinity of Fort Davis ; or more rounded contours, as at Wild Rose Pass. Limestones of various ages occur in these mountains, and numerous springs burst forth from the contact of the intrusive porphyrics with the other rocks. Such are Apache and Antelope Springs, near San Martine. These are the best-wooded of all the moun- tains of the region, and Limpia Creek, in the vicinity of Fort Davis, affords suffi- cient water for a certain quantity of irrigation. South of Alpine, the Maravillas, or Santiago range, extends southeastward through Brewster and Foley Counties, a distance of sixty-five miles or more, towards the Rio Grande, where it meets the Rosillos, Corrazones, and Chisos groups. All these mountains are built up of " . igneous rocks, with limestone, sandstones, and shales, and are as yet little known.
The flats between the various mountain ranges are the sites of old lakes, the last stages of some of which may now be seen in Salt Lake valley, between the Diabolo and Guadalupe Mountains. These lakes probably existed in the region during long periods, for borings have penetrated more than a thousand feet without pass- ing through the deposits which belong to them. They are at least as old as the
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quaternary, from the fact that certain elephant remains have been found in them, and, from certain "calico hills" in the Rio Grande valley, it is probable that they existed even in tertiary times. These flats are covered with a luxuriant growth of gramma, or mesquite grass, which, although usually brown in appearance, will freshen with very little rain-fall and clothe the plain in richest verdure. Catelaws, greaseweed, Mexican dagger, cacti of various kinds, and many other plants of Mexican relationship grow upon them, and they are the grazing ground for herds of antelope.
Rivers .- Texas is drained by rivers flowing from the outer edges of the different great plains, radially towards the Gulf, the character of the streams dif- fering among themselves, and each stream varying according to the plains through which it passes. The two limiting river systems are the Arkansas and Rio Grande. These, although their head-waters approach very nearly to each other, separate rapidly and find their way to the Gulf at points hundreds of miles apart.
The oldest drainage of the State is probably that of the Colorado, which may have had its inception before the deposition of the coal measures, and, although often interrupted and diverted, it has returned again and again to its work of erosion, and in places has reconquered and holds to-day its old drainage channels. On the emergence of the land, at the elose of the paleozoic era, erosion scored and ravined its surface, and the predecessors of the Brazos and the Red Rivers were born. Through long ages they continued their work, cutting down and bearing away the soil and rock, until the cretaceous sea overwhelmed them and built new rock-beds above their channels to a height of hundreds of feet. Again the sea-floor became the land, and again the rivers came to the attack, and have not only regained the territory they had lost, except that here and there an outpost is left to tell the extent of their victory, but have in addition scored deeper into the underlying beds. With each new aceretion of land new streams gradually developed, the old ones extended themselves gulfward, and at the same time continued to advance their head-waters, thereby growing in both directions.
The various systems may be grouped under the following heads : Rivers having their origin outside of the State,-Canadian, Red, Pecos, and Rio Grande ; rivers of the Central Basin, -Trinity, Brazos, and Colorado ; rivers of the Grand Prairie, -Sabine, Neches, Guadalupe, and Nueces ; rivers of the Reynosa, -San Jacinto, Buffalo, Bernard, Lavaca, etc .; and streams of the Coast Prairies.
The Canadian has its origin in New Mexico, on the eastern slope of the narrow Taos range of the Rocky Mountains, only a few miles from the waters of the Rio Grande, which flows at the western foot of the same range. Running eastward it drains the northern portion of the Panhandle through a valley twenty to sixty miles in width and hundreds of feet below the level of the Llano Estacado,-a valley which has been eut by the waters of this river since the final desiccation of * the old lake-basin. The stream which now winds through this valley is so shrunken as to appear incapable of having performed so hereulean a task.
Red River is classed with the. Brazos and Colorado as having its origin in the canyons of the Staked Plains, but one branch, the Prairie-Dog- Town Fork, reaches into New Mexico, and it must, therefore, be classed with the rivers originating without the State. This fork, as well as the others, is still at work channelling
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VIEW FROM QUITMAN MOUNTAINS TOWARDS FOOTHILLS.
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deeper into the plain, and they have cut canyons hundreds of fect in depth and many miles in length through its comparatively soft materials. In addition to the amount of water furnished by the upper beds of the Staked Plains, as the erosion cuts through the underlying conglomerate of the triassic, it taps the great water-bed of the Llano and the pure water gushes forth from springs, furnishing streams which flow boldly out from the plains only to sink and disappear when they reach the adjoining belt of sand. After crossing the sands of the triassic and reaching the permian beds, the water of these streams dissolves portions of the salt and gypsum existing therein, and is then more or less saline or gypseous for many miles of their course. The river takes its name from the amount of red clay held in suspension, which it derives from these red beds in its passage through them, and which it car- ries onward throughout its course. After following an almost eastward course for many miles, forming the northern boundary of the State for the whole distance, from the intersection of the North Fork and one hundredth meridian, it turns southward.
In the system of lakes along the western boundary of Louisiana, only one or two of which, like Caddo Lake, reach into Texas, there exists a condition which in earlier times was very prevalent among the various streams in their passage across the lignitic plain. To-day, along these rivers, may be found such old lake-basins plainly defined, which have been filled in with sediment from the overburdened streamn that, by later elevations, has been given fresh erosive power, and has cut new channels through them to the underlying rock.
This river drains twenty-nine thousand square miles, more than one-tenth of the entire State, and yet, east of its own principal forks, has no large affluents on the south side, except Pease River, the Wichita and Sulphur Rivers. Like all the Texas rivers, it has in the eastern part of its course its first and second bottoms between its channel and the uplands. The first of these has deep-red, sandy or waxy soils, heavily timbered with cotton-wood, elm, ash, walnut, pecan, cte. Beyond this is the second bottom or higher elevation, of dark, sandy loam, extending back to the bluffs. These bottoms are from one to two miles wide, and are succeeded by high, rolling uplands, ten to fifteen miles in width, timbered with oak and hickory, and interspersed with little prairies.
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