THE PASTORAL LANDS OF AMERICA. 309 
what may be termed the migratory plan. The climate is dry and the soil is gravelly; 
producing the most nutritious grasses and shrubs: of tke former the grama and 
the bunch grass, of which there are two er three varieties; and of the latter, the 
various kinds of sage, which make the best and most nutritious browsing; besides a 
large amount of underbrush and reed grass in the mountains. Were it not for the inse- 
curity of life and property, caused by the wild marauding bands of Indians, especially 
the Navajoes, but a few years would elapse before the hills and plains of New Mexico 
would be literally covered with fleecy flocks. It is but afew years back, and within 
my own recollection, when nearly 1,000,000 sheep were annually driven to market 
in Southern Mexico from our Territory. Atthat time sheep were worth but 25 cents a 
head, and all those engaged in the business made money. That prosperity in the history 
of New Mexico was superinduced by twelve years of uninterrupted peace with the 
Navajoes. A sheep-raiser in New Mexico can safely calculate on an annual increase 
of 80 per centum, and, notwithstanding the coarse quality of the wool of the present 
stock, can herd his sheep and make a profit from the product of his wool and have all 
the increase of his stock in addition to this. I have no hesitation in saying that if 
peaceful relations are established with the Indian tribes, New Mexico can fairly com- 
pete with Australia, South Africa, and South America in the production of cheap wools. 
This statement may appear to you somewhat exaggerated, but I assure you that it is 
within reasonable bounds. I was born and reared in New Mexico. My friends and 
relatives have always owned sheep, and I myself have been an owner of this kind of 
property, and therefore, to a great extent, speak from personal experience. 
This mass of testimony ought to be conclusive and satisfactory as to 
winter grazing and the great future of the Rocky Mountain region as a 
grazing country. The great valley of the North Platte is worthy of 
particular description. The distance from the mouth of the North 
Platte, where it joins the South Platte on the Union Pacific Railroad, 
to its source in the great Sierra Madre which, with its lofty sides, forms 
the North Park in which this stream takes its rise, is more than eight 
hundred miles. Its extreme southern tributaries head in the gorges of 
the mountains ene hundred miles south of the railroad, and receive their 
waters from the melting snows of these snow-capped ranges. Its ex- 
treme western tributaries rise in the Wind River range, sharing the 
erystal snow-waters from the continental divide with the Columbia and 
Colorado of the Pacific. Its northern tributaries start oceanward from 
the Big Horn Mountains, three hundred miles north of the starting 
pomt of its southern sources. It drains a country larger than New 
England and New York together. The main valley of the North Platte, 
two hundred miles from its mouth, to the point where it debouches 
through the Biack Hills into the great plains, is, on an average, ten 
miles wide. Nearly all this area, two thousand square miles, is covered 
with a dense growth of grass, yielding thousands of tons of hay. The 
lufis bordering these intervals are rounded and grass-grown, gradually 
smoothing out into great grassy plains, extending north and south as 
far as the eye can see. The tributaries on the north side of the Platte 
are the Blue Water, Cold Water, Hill Creek, Raw Hide, Muddy, Wil- 
low, Shawnee, Slate, and Sweet Water. On the south, they are the 
Ash, Pumpkin, Larran’s, Dry, Horse, Cherry, Chugwater, Sybelle, Big 
Laramie, Carter, Cottonwood, Horséshoe, Elk Horn, La Prele, Boisée, 
- Deer Creek, Medicine Bow, Rock Creek, Douglass, North, South, and 
Middle Forks of the main Platte. These streams, with their smaller 
feeders, intersect in all directions a great pastoral land, interspersing 
it with rich fertile valleys, draining at least 40,000,060 acres, and at- 
fording water for countless herds. Most of the banks of these streams 
are bordered with timber. Cattle have been wintered on these streams 
north ef Cheyenne, along the base of the Black Hills and around Fort 
Laramie, for twenty years. | 
Of this country Mr, Alexander Majors, in a recent letter, says: 
The favorite wintering ground of my herds for the past twenty years has been from 
the Cache a la Poudre on the south, to Fort Fetterman on the north, embracing all the 
country along the eastern base of the Black Hills, ak 
- 
