154 THE CANADIAN COUNTRY. 
and through a region of which we knew ab- 
solutely nothing, except from what we could 
gather from our Comanche pilot. This trail, 
which our wagons had made the previous 
’ summer, was still here a henceforth there 
was an end to all mis 
If we take a Nnopontes view of the coun- 
try over which we travelled, we shall find but 
little that can ever present attractions to the 
agriculturist. Most of the low valleys of the 
Canadian, for a distance of five hundred miles, 
are either too sandy or too marshy for cultiva- 
tion; and the upland prairies are, in many 
places, but little else than sand-hills. In some 
parts, it is true, they are firm and fertile, but 
wholly destitute of timber, with the exceptiou 
of a diminutive branch of the Cross Timbers, 
which occupies a portion of the ridge betwixt 
the Canadian and the North Fork. The Ca- 
nadian river itself is still more bare of timber 
than the upper Arkansas. Jn its whole course 
through the plains, there is but little except 
cottonwood, and that very scantily scattered 
along its banks—in some places, for leagues 
together, not a stick is to be seen. Except it 
be near the Mountains, where the valleys are 
more fertile, it is only the little narrow valleys 
which skirt many of its tributary rivulets that 
indicate any amenity. Some of these are 
rich and beautiful in the extreme, timbered 
with walnut, mulberry, oak, elm, hackberry, 
and occasionally cedar about the ‘bluffs. 
€ now continued our journey without 
encountering any further casualty, except in 
