222 Annals of the Carnegie Museum. 



places to be cut for hay ; in fact it is sometimes cut for that purpose on 

 the prairies. Among the white or gray iron-stained buttes and along 

 the ravines were thickets of ash, box-elder, plum, choke-cherry, and 

 buffalo-berry, and in some places a few elms. On the edges of the 

 thickets and on the grassy plots the scarlet horse-mint {Monarda 

 didyma), with its bright, showy flowers, was in bloom, and the wald 

 sunflower grew on the slopes. There were many species of Compositae, 

 a Solamim, and other flowers. Over the thickets of low bushes and 

 smaller trees the white-flowered Clematis trailed, and an occasional hop 

 scented the air with its wholesome odor. There are a hundred cozy 

 nooks and picturesque miniature woodlands quietly reposing among 

 the many-tinted hills. It is a land difficult to picture to one who has 

 not seen it, so varied are the details of its topographic forms, so di- 

 verse its coloring ; only the camera can show the former and the 

 skillful brush of the painter the latter. 



After we left the river and started through the hills the road, if it 

 can be called a road, is one which requires a thorough knowledge of 

 the region and experience as a horseman to traverse without mishap. 

 Sometimes for a little distance there is an old wagon-road, or a dim 

 trail to follow, but suddenly it " plays out " on a grassy slope by some 

 precipitous ravine, or on a steep declivity, and one turns one way and 

 another to see where to go in order to avoid a mishap. One must 

 have the eye of a mechanic or a topographer to tell where to drive 

 around a steep slope without upsetting the wagon. Now the wagon 

 descends into a narrow ravine where one is almost above the horses, 

 but is saved from falling on them by a sudden reversal of the rela- 

 tive positions of horses and wagon ; and before one has time to fall 

 out behind, the wagon is again on more level ground. Where there is 

 a piece of road that is reasonably level and the buggy is not liable to 

 upset, we go tearing along at a high rate of speed. Now we ascend 

 and twist and turn, until at last we find ourselves on a grassy divide 

 between two compound ravines, where we can gaze far over the sur- 

 rounding country, a wilderness of bluffs separated by grassy valleys, 

 or wooded ravines. We try in vain to tell whence we came, or 

 whither we are going. To the westward we get views of the main 

 valley of the river, with its apparently flat bottom lying between steep 

 slopes and perpendicular bluffs. This river valley is a pretty sight, 

 whether one travels along its course, or catches glimpses of it through 

 the openings among the maze of hills. In places along the course of 



