248 GEOLOGICAL SUEYEY OF THE TEERITOEIES. 



After leaviDg this we entered upon a dry desert tract, but sparsely 

 covered with stunted artemisia. The sand in some places was very deep, 

 and caused the wagons to drag heavily. This continued until we reached 

 Kamas Creek, and even there the sand is often deep, and in some places 

 cast up in long, low, rolling ridges. A few cotton- woods remain on the 

 hank of this stream, but the bordering country has the most barren as- 

 spect of any that we have seen. From this point to the mountains, 

 some twenty-five miles distant, which form the dividing line betweeu 

 Idaho and Montana, the character of the country was much the same as 

 that just described. 



As we come near the foot of the range, the land begins to rise gradnally, 

 and is much better grassed than that we had passed over during the 

 two previous days, and the occasional little streams that flow down will 

 afi'ord a means of irrigating small areas. Bat I think the climate is 

 quite se\ ere, and that only the hardiest cereals and vegetables can be 

 grown : but as there are no settlements here, no experiments iu this 

 direction have been made. 



CHAPTER IV. 



MONTANA TEEKITOKY.* 



Montana, with the exception of Alaska, is the most recently organized 

 Territory of the United States. Embracing that region lying between the 

 forty-fifth and forty-ninth parallels of north latitude and one hundred and 

 fourth and one hundred and sixteenth meridians of west longitude, it 

 contains an area of 143,770 square miles or 92,010,040 acres, extending 

 from east to west about five hundred and fifty miles, and from north 

 to south about two hundred and eighty miles. It is separated into two 

 very unequal areas by the dividing range of the Eocky Mountains, 

 which forms the southwestern boundary from the west line of Wyoming 

 to the intersection of -lo^ 40' north latitude and the one hundred and 

 fourteenth meridian. Here it suddenly bends eastward for soine dis- 

 tance, and then runs north about twenty degrees wt'st to the northern 

 boundary of the Territory. About one-fifth of the entire area belongs 

 to the Pacific slope, being drained by the head-waters of the Cohmdiia, 

 and four-fifths to the Atlantic slope, being drained by the Missouri and 

 its tributaries. Extending from tbe mouth of the Yellowstone to the 

 summit of the Bitter-Eoot Eange, about two-fifths belong to the mount- 

 ain region, three-fifths consisting of broad, open plains lying east of the 

 Eocky Mountain Eange. The mountain belt, which forms a broad mar- 

 gin along the western end, has probably an average width (direct meas- 

 ui'ement from tbe summit of the Bitter-Eoot Eange to the east flank of 

 the Eocky Mountains) of one hundred and seventy-five miles, running 

 northwest parallel to the western boundary. Besides these two leading 

 ranges and their interlocking siuirson the western slope, there are some 

 minor ranges on the eastern side, which though comparatively small in 

 extent are important in respect to the influence they have upon the 

 course of the water-drainage and the form and direction of the prin- 

 cipal valleys. In the northwest corner of Wyoming, near the point 

 where the dividing range makes the western bend and passes out of 

 this Territory, is what appears to be the great mountain nucleus of this 



^^ The substance of this chapter has been furnished the Agricultural Department, 

 and will appear in tbe Eeport of that Department for 1871. 



