The Sevier River has its course along the southeastern border of the Great Basin of the west, and its upper streams head in the lofty divide which separates the drainage system of the Colorado River on the south and east from the drainage system of the Great Basin on the north and west. The general course of the upper portion of the stream is from south to north, though its tributaries flow in many directions. The lower portion of the stream, within 60 miles of its end, suddenly breaks through one of the Basin Ranges on the west--the Pavant--and then turns southwestward and empties into Sevier Lake, one of the salinas of the Great Basin. The main valley of the Sevier River has a N. S. trend, and begins on the divide referred to, about 270 miles almost due south of Great Salt Lake, and continues northward a distance of about 170 miles. There are three principal forks of this stream. The lowest fork is at Gunnison, 140 miles south of Salt Lake City, and called the San Pete, which waters a fine valley about 45 miles in length, and which is at present the most important agricultural district in Utah. About 80 miles farther up the stream, at Circle Valley, the river divides into two very nearly equal branches; one coming from the south, the other breaking through a great plateau on the east. These are called, respectively, the South and East Fork of the Sevier. The South Fork has its principal fountains far up on the surface of a great plateau--the Panguitch Plateau--whose broad expanse it drains by three considerable streams, which finally unite in the valley at the foot of its eastern slope. The East Fork of the Sevier receives the waters of a beautiful valley lying to the eastward of and parallel to the main valley of the Sevier, and separated from it by a lofty plateau 90 miles in length from north to south, and from 10 to 20 miles in breadth, called the Sevier Plateau. Through this great barrier the stream has cut a wide gorge 4,000 feet in depth and 10 miles long, called East Fork Cañon, and right at its lower end it joins the South Fork of the Sevier.