At Billings we passed through a heavy snow storm, but as we journeyed westward we felt the warm touch of the Chennock, as it swept down the valley, bringing life and beauty in its gentle touch. Every hilltop is rounded and covered with grasses, and it does not seem possible that on all this round globe there is another valley with such a wealth of graceful curves and delicate colors.
Enthroned at the head of the valley, Livingston sits a very queen; in her right hand the Yellowstone Park, in her left the Bozeman Pass over the Rockies, Emigrant, Crazy, and Baldhead mountains, seemingly but a mile away, though in reality more than fifty, lift their hoary heads fourteen thousand feet toward the heavens, and sparkle in the sunlight like jewels in her crown.
Northern Dakota and Manitoba are very cold countries. In the rural districts the inhabitants do not pretend to have schools in the winter, it is so cold they would not dare to let the children attend. Sometimes during storms men fear to leave their stores at night, and remain in them rather than risk their lives in going home; farmers tie a rope around their bodies, fastening one end to their cabins, when they go out to feed their cattle, and no one leaves home that can avoid it.
But with proper preparation colonies will make no mistake in locating in Dakota or Montana, and the same may be said of individuals. For lack of correct information parties are sometimes deceived. A story is told of a party of German emigrants, who came this spring from across the sea. They had been induced to come by some foreign agent, who had given them a picture of Gladstone, a beautiful little village, and had agreed to locate them there on government lands. Instead of fulfilling his promise he located them several miles away, where there was not a cabin in sight. Said an eye-witness: “It was laughable and sad to see them. Each man had a cut of Gladstone in his hand, and they were all looking for the houses.”
There are rare opportunities to make fortunes; the soil is exceedingly fertile, especially so in Dakota; the cereals grow abundantly, even with the poor farming practiced. Farms and city lots, properly located in thriving towns, are steadily increasing in value, and there are plenty of government lands yet unoccupied, in excellent localities. The Northern Pacific Railroad has any quantity of its very best lands, between Jamestown and Bismarck, yet unsold. One can scarcely make a mistake in settling there, because the land is high and not subject to inundation. There are splendid opportunities in all the country around Bismarck and north, even to the far-famed Turtle Mountains. In all the above-mentioned section success is assured to the patient, hard-working settler. He will have to endure privations; the severe cold of an almost arctic winter; a rude cabin for a dwelling-place; loss of opportunities for education; few churches or Sunday-schools, and a promiscuous population. There are many men and women of culture among the people, but there are also a great many adventurers, as in every new country. But in time all this will change, roads will be worked, schools and churches will be built, cabins will be changed into elegant farm-houses, and society will crystallize as it has done in eastern centers. All this will come after the struggle for existence, which is now going on, is over.
[COMING CHAUTAUQUA DAYS.]
Quite a scientific season will this of ’83 be, recalling the distinguished programs when Prof. Doremus illuminated them. Now, in addition to the graphic Prof. Edwards, who reappears, there is to be the brilliant course of Prof. W. C. Richards, the bare reading of which is like a menu to a famished intellect. Dr. Newell, of Chicago, and Prof. Young, of Princeton College, also lecture on scientific topics. It is to be a revival in physics.
The lessons in cookery, by Miss Ewing, are a recognition of the growing interest in higher culinary art, an accomplishment considered by some to be the highest of all arts, as it certainly is the most important to mankind. Chautauqua proposes to contribute its share to make this art universal, until it can no longer be said that the chef of a hotel can command a higher salary than the president of a college.