MONTAGUE COUNTY. 507 



These soils are generally light sandy, yet in places there is more or less clay 

 subsoil, and while these produce fine crops of corn and cotton, they are pre- 

 eminently suitable for fruit raising. This part of the Upper Cross Timbers 

 is destined to become one of the greatest fruit raising districts in the State, 

 and being in direct communication with Colorado over the Fort Worth and 

 Denver Railway, ready market can be found for all the early fruit that can be 

 raised. There is no place in the State where peaches grow to better advantage 

 or to greater perfection, and they can be put on the market in the North 

 months before the earliest fruits mature there. 



TIMBER. 



This county is almost entirely within the Upper Cross Timbers. It is en- 

 tirely so except along its western border. The timber is post oak and black- 

 jack, with elm and hickory along the streams and cottonwood on Red River. 

 Although this timber is rather scrubby and seldom grows very high or large, 

 yet it supplies all necessary demands for domestic purposes and makes good 

 ties for railroad building. It also makes good fence posts and is used exten- 

 sively for such purposes on the adjoining prairies. 



WATER. 



The water supply in this county is mostly confined to shallow wells, which 

 can be had at any locality at from ten to thirty feet in depth. There is always 

 an abundance of water in the Trinity Sands and in the sandstones of the Car- 

 boniferous. No attempt, so far as I am informed, has been made to sink 

 deep wells, as no occasion has been found for a greater supply of water than 

 is found in the shallow wells. 



Some of the streams in the county supply water for stock purposes part of 

 the year, and some of them all of the time. Many large open tanks have 

 been built, and there need be no scarcity of water for any purpose by taking 

 the necessary trouble to secure it. There are men in all countries who will 

 haul water from a neighbor's well or tank, or creek or river, for years, when 

 three or four days work would give them a good well or tank of their own, 

 and so it is in this county. 



The water is generally found in sand or sandstone, and is comparatively 

 free from impurities. 



BUILDING MATERIAL. 



The sandstone along the western part of this county makes an excellent 

 building stone. It is easily quarried and dressed and hardens on exposure. 

 It is a light brown in color and makes a very neat structure. The court house 



