The New York herald., 1874-07-31
Tho Great West.

| upon our Territories Those Ierrltorles
embrace one-half of the area OF the
United States. The chief Characteristic OF
the East is moist climate OF the West a
dry one ; so that the United States are divided
into two equal parts, having two different cll-
mates-one corresponding to the climate OF
Europe and one to the climate of Asia. The
average annual rainfall of one is about fifty
inches, and of the other fifteen inches. The
Territories of the interior are Montana,
Idaho, Utah, Wyoming, Colorado, New Mex
leo and Arizona Dakota and Washington
might, in part, be included, but they do not
belong to this group. Along the eastern bor-
der are the plains, two hundred miles wide
and one thousand miles long. The plains
have greater extent eastward, for they lap
over into Kansas, Nebraska and Dakota, two
hundred miles more, so that they are four
hundred miles wide and one thousand miles
long, and this side of their eastern meridian
line the country may be called q prairie
where the rainfall is sufficient to grow all
farm products, and beyond it is called the
plains, where no crops can be grown without
irrigation. Let us say, then, that the East is
moist, the West is arid.
From the west boundary of the plains rise
the Rocky Mountains, and all the remainder
of these Territories is mountainous, there
being no more plains and here great rivers
have their source-the Missouri, the Platte
the Arkansas, the Red and the Rio Grande on
the east side, and the Columbia, the
Grand, the Green, the Gila and the Colo
RADIO on the west Within the mountains
are many small rivers and streams, which
sink or discharge into lakes having no outlet.
The eastern elevation of the plains is about two
thousand feet above the sea at the base
of the mountains the average is about five
thousand feet and the whole average of these
Territories must be six thousand feet, or more
than mile. The loftiest mountains some of
which stand upon the borders Of the plains,
are nearly three miles high, and of such in
the whole range there are over two hundred.
The most valuable portion of the great in
terror is, at present. along the eastern base of
the mountains, stretching from British America
to old Mexico, and it is probable that it will
always remain most valuable on account Of
the superior pastoral and agricultural re-
sources; for the plains are covered with a
nutritious grass, which, according to un-
doubted testimony, furnishes feed we'll suited
for horses, cattle and sheep the year round,
inasmuch as there are no fall or '1atter
rains" to bleach and destroy it's value for
winter pasture, and seldom does snow cover
the ground Even California does not possess
this advantage, and there are few other
regions in the world which do, because
they have the latter rains. The region which
is similar lies in Central Asia, stretching
through Turkistan, Bokhara, and what is
called the great Desert OF Cobb; but this is less
valuable than the American steppes, for it is
between lines Of latitude without climatic
variation, while here the course is across lines
of Latitude reaching from the frigid to the
tropical 1t is manifest that the revenue to
be derived from the grass Of the plains must be
constant and long, and in the aggregate enor-
nous. The many rivers and streams which
issue from the mountain canyons furnish water
sufficient to irrigate not far from five millions
of acres-that is, from the Missouri to the Rio
Grande. This does not seem large amount
of land in cultivation, but it is large when
irrigation is considered; and as the average
yield Of such land is double the yield of the
Atlantic States, and as the plains will support
millions of cattle, the capacity Of the country
of this long line for supporting human beings
may be estimated at not less than fifteen mill
ions. Of necessity population must be
gathered in the valleys and largely in cities
and in towns, while the country beyond the
irrigatng canals must be forever devoted
to pastoral solitudes, to cross which will
require from two to five, ten and in some
cases twenty-four hours travel
Mountains perpetually covered with snow
are always seen from irrigated fields whether
in the Eastern or Western world, because d
sufficient supply of water during the hot
months of summer can be obtained only from
melted snow and hence it may be said that
glaciers and snow fields formed part of the
landscape beheld by our first parents in the
Garden of Eden, which was watered by rivers.
Thus the human race was nurtured by the
side Of murmuring waters, and in climate
where the sun ever shines and having spread
thence to lands beneath rainy Skies it has
finally in these last ages, completed the cir
cult of the earth, and again are beheld gardens
and fields made green with the waters of
melted snow.
The common mind believes, without know
ing, that amidst mountains nothing can be
grown unless it be forests, and that they are
uninhabitable. But the Rocky Mountains are
different, and we have reports from scientific
and practical men that the rainfall in the
mountains is considerable, for these ele-
waited masses arrest or attract the moisture
evaporated from the smooth surface of the
plains below, which in winter falls in
snow and in summer in rain, so
that unon slonea and nlateans oil kinds