OF THE NORTHWEST. 65 
of the two largest rivers on the globe. There are no elevated peaks, rising in 
majestic grandeur; no mountain torrents, shrouded in foam, and chafing in their 
rocky channels; no deep and narrow valleys, hemmed in on every side, and form- 
ing, as it were, a little world of their own; no narrow and precipitous passes, 
winding through circuitous defiles; no cavernous gorges, giving exit to pent-up 
waters; no contorted and twisted strata, affording evidence of gigantic uplift and 
violent throes. But the features of the scene, though less grand and bold than 
those of mountainous regions, are yet impressive and strongly marked. We find 
the luxuriant sward, clothing the hill-slope even down to the water's edge. We 
have the steep cliff, shooting up through it in mural escarpments. We have the 
CASTELLATED APPEARANCE OF LOWER MAGNESIAN LIMESTONE, UPPER IOWA. 
stream, clear as crystal, now quiet and smooth and glassy, then ruffled by a 
temporary rapid, or, when a terrace of rock abruptly crosses it, broken up into a 
small, romantic cascade. We have clumps of trees, disposed with an effect that 
might baffle the landscape gardener, now crowning the grassy height, now dotting 
the green slope with partial and isolated shade. From the hilltops, the intervening 
valleys wear the aspect of cultivated meadows and rich pasture-grounds, irrigated 
by frequent rivulets, that wend their way through fields of wild hay, fringed with 
flourishing willows. Here and there, occupying its nook, on the bank of the 
stream, at some favourable spot, occurs the solitary wigwam, with its scanty appur- 
tenances. On the summit-levels spreads the wide prairie, decked with flowers of 
the gayest hue,—its long, undulating waves stretching away till sky and meadow 
9 
