New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1859-06-11
AN OVERLAND JOURNEY.
WON THE PLAINS.
Station 9, Pixies Peak Express Co,
PIPE CREEK. Nav %. 1859.

PIPE CREEK, May %, 1859.
Twas detained at Manhattan nearly day longer
than had intended TO be by high water. Wild
eat Eve miles west, and Rock Creek, seven
teen miles east, both impossible on Thursday'
% that an express wagon from Pixies Peak was
stopped behind the former, while FIVE mail coaches
and express wagons faced each other through part
Of Ihur,dsy and all of Thursday night across 'ne
latter. Next morning however, each had run ou''
10 that they could be forded and at j p m took
NV ,eat in the Pixies Peak express, and again
moved westward
Our way was still along the L. 5. Military Road,
crossing Wildcat, low a reasonable stream, and
winding for some miles over rugged, thlnsollcd
limestone hills, then striking down south westward
into the prairie bottom Of the Kansas which s as
rich % land need be. a few miles OF this brought
rs to OGDEN, a landoffice city Of thirty or forty
houses, some Of them well built of stone. Just
beyond this begins the Fort Riley reservation, a
beautiful tract Of prairie and timber stretching for
four or FIVE miles along the northern bank OF the
Kansas, and including the Fad remains OF Pawnee
CITY, at which Gov. Reeder summoned the hrst
(bogus) Legislature of Kansas TO meet-then DO to
100 miles westward Of any where. They obeyed
the summons, but forthwith adjourned TO Shawnee
Mission, a Pro Slavery stronghold on the Mis-
souri border Pawnee City is now of the things
that were.
Fort Riley is a position which does credit TO the
taste Of whoever selected it. II is on high, rolling
prairie with the Kansas on the south, the Repub
lean on the west, heavy Limestone bluffs on the
north. and the best timber in Middle or Western
Kansas all around. The barracks are comfortable,
the hospital large and well placed the officers
quarters spacious and elegant and the stables most
Extensive and admirable. hear that Two Millions
of Uncle Sans money have been expended in
making these snug arrangements, and that the
Oats largely consumed here have often cost So per
busbel have of course seen nothing else at all
comparable to this in the way of preparations for
passing life agreeably since left the Missouri.
We here crossed by rope ferry the Republican
or northern fork of the Kansas, which, like the
Big Blue, twenty five miles back seems nearly as
large as the Kansas at its mouth, though the
Smoky Hid, or southern fork at this point, is said
to be the largest of the three We met at the
ferry number Of families, with large herd Of
cattle, migrating from southwestern Missouri to
California, and crossing fere to take tue road up
the right bank of the Republican to Fort Kearney
and so to Laramie. They had exhausted their
patience in trying to swim their cattle, and would
hardly be able to get them oil ferried over till next
day. All day. as on preceding days, we had been
meeting Ox-wagons loaded with disheartened Pixies
Peakers, returning to their homes, but some of
them going down into southern Kansas IN search
of 4" clams." Most Of those we interr0gated said
they had been out az far ss Fort Kearney (sone
200 miles further, j beleve,) before they were
turned back by assurances that Pixies Peak is
humbug.
Across the Republican, between it and the
SMOKY Hill, is junction City, as yet the most
western village in Kansas, save that another has
been started some fifty miles up the Smoky Hill.
We stopped here for the night and talked Re
publcanism in the church for an hour or so. Junc
ton has store, two hotels, and some thirty or
forty dwellings. one of which is distinguished TO;
its age, having been erected so long ago as 1858.
A patriotic Junctoner excused his city for not pos
sessing something which inquired for, but which
ts rival, Manhattan, vas supposed to have; for,
said he, "Manbattsn is three years old" As
Junction is hardly year oil yet, the relative an
tiquity of Manhattan, and theresponsibiites therein
involved, were indisputable Junction is the cen
ter Of fine agricultural region, though timber is
not 90 abundant here as | wish it were. This re-
sion is being rapidly shingled with "clains;" l
hope il is likewise to be filled with setters-though
that does not always follow. Our landlord "a Ger
many bad tried California; then Texas; and now
he is trying Kansas, which seems to agree with
him.
We started again at this morning, making a
little north of west, and keeping the narrow belts
of timber along the Republican and the Smoky
Hill respectively in full view for several miles, until
the streams dverged so far that we lost them in the
boundless sea of grass. A mile or two of progress
carried us beyond any road but that traced only
this spring for the Pixies Peak expresses; for ten
miles onward, no house, no field no sign of human
agency, this road and a few United States survey
ors' stakes excepted, was visible; at length We
came to where wretched cabin and an acre or so
of broken and fenced prairie showed what q po-
neer had been doing in the last two or three years
and beside it was tsvern-the last, presume, this
aide of Pixies Peak Ii consisted Of crotched
stake which, with the squatter's fence aforesaid,
supported ridge -poe, across which some old sail
cloth was drawn, hanging down on either side, aud
forming cabin some six by eight feet, and per-
hsps from three TO Eve and half feet high-large
enough to contain tive whisky barrels, two decan-
tiers, two glasses, three or four cans of picked
oysters and two or three boxes of sardines, but
nothing Of the bread Kind whatever. The hotel