CATTLE-GROWING OUT WEST. 85 



where the grass grows and ripens untouched from one 

 year's end to the other. I believe there is no place in 

 this section of the country, from latitude 47° down, 

 where cattle and sheep will not winter safely with no 

 feed but what they will pick up, and with only the 

 rudest shelter. In the mountains or in the valleys of 

 the mountain streams they would find ample shelter 

 from storms in the frequent canons and ravines. The 

 mountain ranges are peculiarly adapted to sheep-rais- 

 ing; the range is unlimited, the grasses are fine, and 

 the air is pure and dry, — conditions which insure 

 healthier stock and better wool than the climate and 

 soil of the low country. I have said that the climate 

 about Big Horn was very mild. As an indication of 

 this I will state that the average temperature in the 

 valley, latitude 45° 30', was, in December, 1867, 32° 

 above ; in January, 1868, 30° above ; in February, 40° 

 above; and in March, 55° above. In August, 1867, 

 the mercury was as high as 107° above. Coal, iron, 

 and fine building-stone are plentiful in the mountains 

 of the Big Horn ranges. Fine clay and limestone are 

 found in abundance, and the mountains furnish good 

 pine timber in fair quantity. Nature has provided 

 most liberally for the wants of civilization in this 

 favored region, and when it is opened up to settlement 

 it will attract a large population, and will prove to be 

 a great producing country." 



Edward Creighton, the great millionaire cattle-owner 

 of Nebraska, wrote, not long before his death, as fol- 

 lows : " My first grazing in the country was in the 

 winter of 1859; since then for many winters I have 



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