The treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, by the transfer of Upper California as it existed and was bounded in May 1848, conferred a magnificent domain upon the United States. This, however, has been subdivided by the action of Congress and the California Convention, and the new Territory or Utah formed out of a portion of it. The original grant comprises the region between the parallels of 32° 50´ and 40° of north latitude, and 106° and 124° west longitude, containing an area of four hundred and forty-eight thousand six hundred and ninety one square miles, or, two hundred and eighty seven million, one hundred and sixty two thousand two hundred and forty acres of land. "In other words, our original territory of Upper California, embraced twelve hundred and two square miles more than the States of Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Iowa and Wisconsin, combined!"3
The California Convention, in shaping their new State, thought it advisable to diminish this unwieldy empire, a large portion of which was, in truth, divided by the evident decree of nature from the Pacific region. Between the Rocky Mountains and the Sierra Nevada, at an elevation of between four thousand and five thousand feet above the sea lies that singular geographical formation which was first explored by Colonel Frémont, and is known as the Great Basin. This is now comprehended in the Territory of Utah. It is about five-hundred miles in diameter, counting either from north to south or east to west; and, imprisoned on all sides by mountains, it has its own complete system of rivers and lakes, all of which have no outlet to the Oceans on either side of the continent. Its steep interior hills and mountains are covered with forests, and rise