RIVERS OF THE PRAIRIES. 195 
mediately north of this sets in that immense 
desert region of the Llano Estacado. 
The chief natural disadvantage to which 
the Great Western Prairies are exposed, con- 
sists in the absence of navigable streams. 
Throughout the whole vast territory which 
I have been attempting to aaa there is 
not a single river, except t issourl, which 
is navigable during the whee season. The 
remaining streams, in their course through the 
plains, are and must continue to be, for all pur- 
poses of commerce, comparatively useless. 
The chief of these rivers are the Missouri, 
the Arkansas, and Red River, with their nu- 
merous tributaries. The principal western 
branches of the Missouri are the Yellow Stone, 
the Platte and the Kansas. Small ‘flats’ and 
‘buffalo boats’ have passed down the two 
former for a considerable distance, during 
high water; but they are never navigable to 
any extent by steamboats. 
The Arkansas river penetrates far into the 
Rocky Mountains, its ramifications, interlock- 
ing with some of the waters of the Missouri, 
Columbia, San Buenaventura, Colorado of 
the West, and Rio del Norte. The channel 
of this stream, in its course through the 
Prairies, is very wide and shallow, with banks 
in many places hardly five feet above low 
water. It will probably measure nearly 2000 
miles in length, from its source to the frontier of 
Arkansas. Itis called Rio Napeste by the Mexi- 
cans; but among the early French voyagers 
it acquired the name of Arkansas, or rather 
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