THE NOETH PLATTE DISTRICT. 489 



with a dense growth of grass, yielding thousands of tons of 

 hay. The bluffs 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. 



" Of the country, Alexander Majors says, in a letter to the 

 writer of this article : ' The favorite wintering ground of my 

 herders 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.' It 

 was of this country that Mr. Seth E. Ward spoke, when he 

 says : 'Iarn satisfied that no country in the same latitude, or 

 even far south of it, is comparable to it as a grazing and stock- 

 raising country. Cattle and stock generally are healthy, and 

 require no feeding the year round, the rich ' bunch ' and 

 'gramma' grasses of the plains and mountains keeping them, 

 ordinarily, fat enough for beef during the entire winter.' 



" All this region east of the Black Hills is at an elevation 

 less than five thousand feet. The climate, as reported from 

 Fort Laramie for a period of twenty years, is 50° Fahrenheit. 

 The mean temperature for the spring months is 47°, for the 

 summer mouths 72°, for autumn 60°, for winter 31°. The 

 annual rain-fall is about eighteen inches — distributed as fol- 

 lows: Spring, 8.69 inches; summer, 5.70 inches; autumn, 3.69 

 inches. The snow fall is eighteen inches. 



" There is in the North Platte Basin, east of the Black Hills 

 divide, at least eight million acres of pasturage, with the 

 finest and most lasting streams, and good shelter in the bluffs 

 and canyons. As I have said before, we can only judge of the 

 extent and resources of such a single region by comparison. 

 Ohio has six million sheep, yielding eighteen million pounds of 

 wool, bringing herd farmers an aggregate of four and one- 



