Among the Rocky Mountains.
Great quantities of iron are found in the low mountains near Lake Superior, where the miners are constantly at work with the help of steam engines and powerful machines.
The richest copper mines of the United States are also found near the shores of Lake Superior. A pig, we are told, discovered the best one of all in a curious way. It had strayed from home and fallen into a pit, where it scratched and rooted in its struggle to get out. In doing this, it laid bare some copper, which was discovered by its master when he went to look for the missing pig.
Hunters are fond of visiting the Rocky Mountains, where they still find the fierce puma, or mountain lion, with its sharp teeth and claws, and bright eyes. Night is its favorite time to roam and it is then that the mountain goat needs to beware, for the cat-like puma shows no mercy. Children who live in the western part of the United States have sometimes seen a grizzly bear brought home by a friend after a hunting trip among the Rocky Mountains. It is the strongest and most dangerous of all the bear family. One blow of its paw is powerful enough to kill, yet if it is not disturbed a person has little to fear. It does not care for the flesh of other animals but is contented with a dinner of berries and tender shoots like its brothers, the brown and black bears.
One of the most graceful animals the children of the west have ever seen is the bighorn, or Rocky Mountain sheep. It browses on the grass found on the steep slopes where the hunter has hard work to reach it. Its ears are quick to hear the slightest sound, when it will toss its head and flee from possible danger with long leaps.
Among the Rocky Mountains are mines of silver, gold, and copper which have brought fortunes to many people of the United States. The silver mines especially are among the richest in the world. The men who work in them generally leave their families at home, and go away to “rough it” as they say, for a mining town seldom has many comforts and the boys and girls who do go there to live miss the good schools, and many other things to which they have been used.
About fifty years ago gold was discovered in the state of California which lies on the shores of the Pacific Ocean. The news filled the country with excitement. As time passed by the gold mines did not prove as rich as the people expected, but they discovered that the country was valuable in other ways. Trees grew to enormous size there and the warm, moist climate of the western coast was the best possible for raising fruit. To-day the children of California feast on pears, plums, apricots, grapes, peaches, oranges, and still other fruits which grow very large and beautiful. There are many wheat farms, too, in California where rich harvests reward the men who own them.
Beyond the Rocky Mountains and lying between them and a lower range called the Sierra Nevada, is a high plateau, where the rain falls into streams which dry up or form lakes before they can make their way to the sea.
The largest of these is called the Great Salt Lake whose water is four times as salty as that of the sea.