324 



FARMERS' REGISTER. 



rNo.6 



yens, and savannahs, in North America, pampas in 

 South America, and steppes in Russia and Tartary, 

 form a very large portion of those parts of the 

 globe. All of these with various grades of fertil- 

 ity; and many points of difference in other re- 

 spects, agree in being, or having been at some 

 time when in a state of nature, bare of trees, or 

 dearly so, and in being clothed with grass of 

 greater or less luxuriance. 



The word "prairie" was first applied by the 

 French colonists, and means in their language, a 

 meadow. The name therefore plainly enough de- 

 signated all land covered only with grass. The 

 name of "barrens" so strangely applied in Ken- 

 tucky to very rich lands, of this kind, was owing 

 to the resemblance of the dry grass on these lands 

 to the broom grass which covers and grows lux- 

 uriantly on the naturally poor soils of Lower Vir- 

 ginia, when left out of cultivation. This resem- 

 blance caused the surveyors who were sent to lay 

 oft' the Virginia military lands, to reject these as 

 barren soil, and the term then so erroneously ap- 

 plied to an extensive region, has still continued to 

 be used, and even has been extended to similar 

 lands elsewhere. 



It will be most sure and satisfactory to use the 

 language of the writers who have seen and de- 

 scribed these regions, rather than to attempt a 

 more general and condensed description, at the 

 risk of changing the purport of their expressions. 

 None of these writers, nor any that I have been 

 able to consult, give any direct and positive tes- 

 timony derived from analysis, as to the soil beinj? 

 supplied, or not, with calcareous ingredients. It 

 is only from incidental observations of the nature 

 of the rocky subsoil, the kinds of grass, &c. that 

 any information of this kind has been indirectly 

 gathered. All that can be said is, that such testi- 

 mony, so far as it goes, is in favor of the calca- 

 reous composition of such soils Generally. Such 

 expressions as most strongly (though indirectly) 

 support my views of the constitution of prairie 

 soils, or show a resemblance of one of Ihcse re- 

 gions to some other better known, will be put in 

 italics. 



The first extracts will be from the Jleivs of Lou- 

 isiana, by H. M. Breckenridgc, a writer intimate- 

 ly acquainted with the western country, and who 

 describes what he had travelled over and seen. 

 The Louisiana of which this work treats includes 

 not only the state as now bounded, but all the vast 

 region lying west of the Mississippi, formerly held 

 under that general name by the French and Span- 

 ish governments. 



"This extensive portion of North America, has 

 usually been described from the inconsiderable part 

 which is occupied by the settlements, as though it 

 were confined to the immediate borders of the Mis-. 

 sissippi, as Egypt is to those of the Nile. By some, 

 it is represented in general description, as a low, 

 flat region, abounding in swamps and subject to in- 

 undation; which is the same thing as if the Neth- 

 erlands should furnish a description for all the rest 

 of Europe. Others speak of Louisiana as one vast 

 forest or wilderness: 



"Missouri marches through his world of woods." 



which is far from being the case, for excepting on 

 the banks of this river, and that not more than 

 one-half its course, the country through which it 



passes, is deplorably deficient in woods. If then, 

 we are to describe Louisiana, not from a small dis- 

 trict, important because already the seat of popula- 

 lion, but from the appearance of the whole, com- 

 bined in a general view, we should say, that it is an 

 extensive region of open plains and meadows, vn- 

 terspersedwithbareuntillablehills, and with the ex- 

 ception of some fertile tracts in the vicinity of the 

 great rivers by which it is traversed, resembling 

 the grassy steppes of Tartary or the Saharas of 

 Africa, but without the numerous morasses and 

 dull uniformity of the one, or the dreary sterility of 

 the other. The fertile tracts are chiefly to be 

 found, in the narrow vallies of the great rivers 

 Missouri, Mississippi, Arkansas, Red River, and 

 some of their principal tributaries; the two largest 

 bodies of fertile soil are the delta of the Mississip- 

 pi, which is much interspersed with lakes, marshes, 

 and sunken lands, that will require ages to reclaim, 

 and the territory of the Missouri, as limited by the 

 boundaries lately agreed on with the Indians, which 

 bears a strong resemblance to the West Tennessee 

 in some of its features." — pp. 06, 67. 



"A remarkable feature in this western side of 

 the great valley [of the Mississipi,] is its deficien- 

 cy of wood, while the opposite, (with the excep- 

 tion of some parts on the north side of the Ohio, 

 where the woods have been burnt;) is a close and 

 deep forest. The woods continue for a short dis- 

 tance up the Mississippi before they disappear, 

 and the grassy plains begin. The banks of the 

 Missouri are clothed with luxuriant forest trees for 

 three or four hundred miles, after which, they 

 gradually become bare, and the trees diminish in 

 size; at first we find thin groves of the kind of pop- 

 lar called cotton wood, but of a diminutive growth, 

 intermixed with willows; next the same tree, re- 

 duced to hall' ils height, and resembling an orchard 

 tree; after this, a thin border of shrubbery is almost 

 the only ornament of the margin of the river. The 

 same thing may be said of the Arkansas and Red 

 liiver. 



"Taking the distance to the muntainsto be about 

 nine lindred miles, of the first two hundred, the lar- 

 ger proportion on the Missouri and its waters, is 

 well adapted to agricultural settlements, its soil 

 and conveniences are equal if not superior to those 

 of Tennessee or Illinois; this tract will include the 

 greater part, of the. White and Osage rivers, the 

 lower Missouri, and for at least one hundred and 

 fifty miles north of this last river. The. proportion 

 of wood gradually lessens to the west, and still 

 more to the north, with the addition that the lands 

 become of an inferior quality. For the next three 

 hundred miles, the country will scarcely admit of 

 compact settlements of any great extent; the 

 wooded parts, form trifling exceptions to its general 

 surface, and are never met with but on the margin 

 of the rivers. We may safely lay it down, that 

 after the first two hundred miles, no trees are 

 found on the uplands, save stinted pines or cedars; 

 the rest of the country consists of open plains of 

 vast magnitude, stretching beyond the boundary 

 of the, eye, and chequered by numerous waving 

 ridges, which enable the traveller, to see his long 

 wearisome journey of several days before him. 

 Yet, it does not seem to me, that the soil of this 

 tract, is any where absolutely unproductive; it is 

 uniformly covered with herbage, though, not. long 

 and luxuriant like that, of the plants nearer the 



