TexasIn The New Encyclopedia of the American West
Called by some observers a state of mind as well as a state of the Union, Texas is a land of geographical contrast. Its citizens have long been famed for their attachment to and bragging about this region of coastal plains, pine forests, cacti-clad deserts, high plains, and rugged mountains, which together stretch across 267, 339 square miles. Ranging from sea level along the Gulf of Mexico to an altitude of 8,751 feet in the Davis Mountains, the land receives 50 inches and more of rainfall each year along its border with Louisiana but fewer than ten inches annually in the semiarid western portion of the state.
