foot in two miles. This fall of the river is seldom used as motive power, except for some flour mills, which are oftener worked by mules than water. The principal advantage at present derived from it is for agriculture, by a well conducted system of irrigation. As to its navigation, it is very doubtful if even canoes could be used in New Mexico, except, perhaps, during May and June, when the stream, from the melting of the snow in the mountains, is at its highest stage. It is entirely too shallow and interrupted by too many sand bars, to promise any thing for transportation; yet, on the southern portion, the recent exploration by Captain Sterling, in the United States steamer Major Brown, has proved that steamboats may ascend for a distance of seven hundred miles between the Gulf and Laredo. This steamer, however, did not draw over two feet of water, but the explorers are of opinion that by spending one hundred thousand dollars in a proper improvement of the Rio Grande above the town of Mier, boats drawing four feet could readily ply between the mouth of the river and Laredo.
The soil in the valley of the Rio Grande, in New Mexico, is generally sandy and appears to be poor; yet, by irrigation, it is made to