218 National Geographic Magazine. 
AREA AND KINnps oF LANDS. 
The total area of Montana is 146,080 square miles, or 
93,491,200 acres. Of this vast empire 31,373,000 acres: or about 
one-third of the whole is agricultural land, while of this 
18,157,000 acres or a little less than one-fifth of the entire area is 
irrigable land, so classified not only because it will, if provided 
with water, raise profitable crops, but also because, in my opinion, 
water can with proper management be provided for it. 
Of the total area of the State only about 1,200,000 acres or less 
than one-sixteenth of the irrigable area may be easily cultivated, 
by this I do not mean that this whole amount is now reclaimed, 
but that it may with the means liable to be employed by private 
parties with limited capital, be readily brought under cultivation 
by the same methods by which most of the lands in Montana are 
now irrigated. 4 
The amount of land actually under cultivation, according to 
the assessment of 1888, was 348,070 acres, and this should prob- 
ably be increased by about one-half, since the farmers doubtless 
greatly underestimated the amounts of their cultivated lands to 
the assessor : perhaps then, 500,000 acres under cultivation would 
be nearer the truth. 
It is estimated that three-fourths of the remaining 75,000,000 
acres not classed above as irrigable, or say 55,000,000 acres, which 
is nearly two-thirds of the total area of the State, will, with the 
increased facilities for watering live stock and for domestic use 
offered by the highest state of irrigation development, become 
valuable as grazing land, since it is naturally covered with an 
abundant growth of bunch grass, and only needs better facilities 
for watering and for the establishment of home farms, to cause it 
to be entirely occupied for grazing purposes. 
Nearly, or quite all, of the lands above classified as agricultural 
and pasture lands, are now covered with an abundant growth of 
bunch grass, occasional patches of sage brush or prickly pear, 
and devoid of any timber other than patches of willows and cot- 
tonwoods along the streams, or a few isolated clumps of scrub 
pines and junipers on the highest lands. 
About 10,000,000 of the remaining 20,000,000 acres are excel- 
lent timber lands and are situated on the slopes and sides of the 
higher mountains, though west of the Continental Divide the 
valleys and flat bench lands are sometimes covered with timber, 
