"It drains a country larger than all New England and New York together. East of the Alleghany Mountains there is no river comparable to this clear, swift mountain stream in its length or in the extent of country it drains.
"The main valley of the North Platte, two hundred miles from its mouth to where it debouches through the Black Hills out on to the great plains, is an average of ten miles wide. Nearly all this area—two thousand square miles—is covered with a dense growth of grass, yielding thousands of tons of hay. The bluffs bordering these intervals are rounded and grass-grown, gradually smoothing out into great grassy plains, extending north and south as far as the eye can see.
"Of the country, Alexander Majors says, in a letter to the writer of this article: 'The favorite wintering ground of my herders for the past twenty years has been from the Caché a la Poudre on the south to Fort Fetterman on the north, embracing all the country along the eastern base of the Black Hills.' It was of this country that Mr. Seth E. Ward spoke, when he says: 'I am satisfied that no country in the same latitude, or even far south of it, is comparable to it as a grazing and stock-raising country. Cattle and stock generally are healthy, and require no feeding the year round, the rich 'bunch' and 'gramma' grasses of the plains and mountains keeping them, ordinarily, fat enough for beef during the entire winter,'
"All this region east of the Black Hills is at an elevation less than five thousand feet. The climate, as reported from Fort Laramie for a period of twenty years, is 50° Fahrenheit. The mean temperature for the spring months is 47°, for the summer months 72°, for autumn 60°, for winter 31°. The annual rain-fall is about eighteen inches—distributed as follows: Spring, 8.69 inches; summer, 5.70 inches; autumn, 3.69 inches. The snow fall is eighteen inches.
"There is in the North Platte Basin, east of the Black Hills divide, at least eight million acres of pasturage, with the finest and most lasting streams, and good shelter in the bluffs and canyons. As I have said before, we can only judge of the extent and resources of such a single region by comparison. Ohio has six million sheep, yielding eighteen million pounds of wool, bringing herd farmers an aggregate of four and one-half million dollars. This eight million acres of pasture would at least feed eight million sheep, yielding twenty-four million pounds of wool, and, at the same price as Ohio wool, six million dollars. Now, this money, instead of going to build up ranches, stock-farms, store-houses, woolen mills, and all the components of a great and thrifty settlement, is sent by our wool-growers and woollen manufacturers to Buenos Ayres, to Africa, and Australia, to enrich other people and other lands, while our wool-growing resources remain undeveloped.
"As you follow the North Platte up through the Black Hill Canyon, you come out upon the great Laramie plains, which lie between the Black Hills on the east and the snowy range on the west. These plains are ninety miles north and south, and sixty miles east and west. They are watered by the Big and Little Laramie Rivers, Deer Creek, Rock Creek, Medicine Bow River, Cooper Creek, and other tributaries of the North Platte. It is on the extreme northern portion of these plains, in the valley of Deer Creek, that General Reynolds wintered during the winter of 1860, and of which he remarks, on pages seventy-four and seventy-five of his 'Explorations of the Yellowstone," as follows:
"Throughout the whole season's march the subsistence of our animals had been obtained by grazing after we had reached our camp in the afternoon, and for an hour or two between the dawn of day and our time of starting. The consequence was that, when we reached our winter quarters there were but few animals in the train that were in a condition to have continued the march without a generous grain diet. Poorer and more broken-down creatures it would be difficult to find. In the spring they were in as fine condition for commencing another season's work as could be desired. A greater change in their appearance could not have been produced even if they had been grain-fed and stable-housed all winter. Only one was lost, the furious storm of December coming on before it had gained sufficient strength to endure it. The fact that seventy exhausted animals, turned out to winter on the plains the first of November, came out in the spring in the best condition, and with the loss of but one of their number, is the most forcible commentary I can make on the quality of the grass and the character of the winter.'
"These plains have been favorite herding grounds of the buffalo away back in the pre-historic age of this country. Their bones lie bleaching in all directions, and their paths, deeply worn, cover the whole plain like a net-work. Their 'wallows,' where these shaggy lords of animal creation tore deep pits into the surface of the ground, are still to be seen. Elk, antelope, and deer still feed here, and the mountain sheep are found on the mountain sides and in the more secluded valleys of the Sierra Madre range—all proving conclusively that this has afforded winter pasturage from time immemorial. Since 1849 many herds of work-oxen, belonging to emigrants, freighters, and ranchmen, have grazed here each winter.
"South of the Laramie plains is the North Park, one of three great parks of the Rocky Mountains, so fully described by Richardson, Bross, and Bowles. This North Park is formed by the great Snowy Range. It is a valley from six to eight thousand feet high, ninety miles long, and forty miles wide, surrounded by snowy mountains from thirteen to fifteen thousand feet high. These mountain tops and sides are completely covered with dense growths of forests; the lower hill-sides and this great valley are covered with grasses. The forests and mountains afford ample shelter from sweeping winds. Here, as well as on the Laramie plains, the buffalo grazed in great herds; and here the Ute hunters, from some hidden canyons, dashed down among them on their trained and fleet ponies, shooting their arrows with unerring aim on all sides, and having such glorious sport as kings might court and envy. The Indians are now gone from this valley, and the buffalo nearly so. On the two million acres in this valley not twenty head of cattle graze.
"This great park, splendidly watered by the three forks of the Platte, and by a hundred small streams that drain these lofty mountains of their snows and rains—rich in all kinds of nutritious grasses, plentifully supplied with timber; on the tertiary coal fields, with iron, copper, lead, and gold—has not one real settler. There are a few miners, but where there should be flocks and herds of sheep and cattle without number, there is only the wild game—the elk, antelope, and deer."