166 EARLY DAY STORIES. 



CHAPTER XXII. 

 The Black Hills. 



What we now call the Black Hills consists of an extens- 

 ive tract of mountainous country lying chiefly in western 

 South Dakota, but extending also from twenty to thirty miles 

 into eastern Wyoming. This tract is enclosed, excepting on 

 the west, by the north and south forks of Cheyenne river, 

 the north fork being known also as the Belle Fourche river. 

 It is a broad tract, covering four entire counties in South 

 Dakota, namely, Lawrence, Meade, Pennington and Custer, 

 and also a portion of the northern part of Fall River county, 

 besides a tract of considerable size in Wyoming. They ex- 

 tend a hundred miles from southeast to northwest, and in the 

 broadest part are eighty miles wide. A hundred years ago, 

 what we now call the Black Hills was an unknown region — 

 what was then called Black Hills, or sometimes Black Moun- 

 tains, lies in central Wyoming, south of the North Platte 

 river, and is now known as the Laramie Mountains. The 

 Black Hills of South Dakota almost touch our own state of 

 Nebraska; in fact our own mountainous country in western 

 and northwestern Nebraska, known as Pine Ridge and the 

 Wild Cat Range, is but a continuation on a smaller scale of 

 the real Black Hills country of South Dakota. 



The Black Hills were so named, so we are told in the 

 old books describing the early explorations in the western 

 country, on account of their dark color, owing to the forest 

 growth of evergreen timber covering their sides ; this timber, 

 consisting of pine, spruce and cedar. This name is appro- 

 priate because it is descriptive in so far as it applies to color, 

 but why they were called hills instead of mountains is not so 

 clear. In some of the old books, and especially Irving's 



