The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1884-03-19

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Our light draught steamer run her bows
merrily into the muddy current, up and
still up, while we admired the volume of
water and the heavy timber here; and
there the prairie stealing away, far as the
eye could reach under the horizon. Some
times we seemed to be steaming through
an ocean forest, as the high water set
back beyond sight over the heavy tim
bered bottom-lands.
Leaving Forts Randall, Sully and Rice,
we lay to at Fort Lincoln, four miles be-
low and opposite to Bismarck, where the
Northern Pacific comes across, having su.
perseded buffalo, Indians and desert with
splendid belt of settlement and civiliza-
ton. As we were passing the mouth of
the Little Missouri, above Fort Berthold,
remarked:
"Pease check off a second thousand
here on the Missouri"
So we continued to puff and cough and
plow along, now studying American ge-
ography, and now admiring the timber
bottoms or magnificent prsiries, and now
returning the wondering gaze of Indians
or buffaloes on the banks. By and by
flagstaff shot aloft, throwing out, in that
upper and lone land, the free folds of the
stripes and stars. suppose it was the
idea of distance from New Orleans, now
more than three thousand miles, which
led my English friend to make the re.
mark, indirectly defensive of the limited
Thames:
1T is always sunrise somewhere on the
British Empire, and her morning gun is
never silent the world round"
"Aud the sun can never hide itself from
the American flag on our own territory"
replied. before sunset has done play
ing with it in Alaska, the sunrise of the
next morning is drying out the dampness
that New Brunswick has thrown upon it
across the Aroostook border. 1t is al
ways sunrise somewhere in the United
States, and her people are always some
where getting up for a days work.
"Where is that flag, ahead yonder ?"
"That is the flag of Fort William, in
the north western corner of Dakota"
els not this large state, or territory,
as you seem to call it ?"
"Fair size; perhaps above the Ameri-
can average. 1t would take in England
three times"
How far does this river run in Da.
kcta?"
"Well, we go out of the territory here
where the Missouri comes in. After it
gets fairly in, it plays and idles about for
one thousand one hundred and seventy
miles before it leaves and goes on its
business to Omaha and st. Louis and
New Orleans. That is nineteen times
the distance" I added, mischievously, up
the Thames to London"
1t was interesting to see how CONT
mental distances affect an islander when
they first strike him. I had often seen
the same effect produced on New En-
gland audience as they followed the same
pointer over the same map. Many of
them, strange to say, had travelled more
in Europe than in their own country.
The sameness of things was making
our trip monotonous, and we hurried our
pointer up toward the Rockies and soon
passed the Yellowstone, about two hun.
bred miles above Fort Berthold. Yet who
ever wearies of the wild immensely of our
Northwest ? The Indians, away from
the forts, were curious and dangerous,
and were willing to try their rifles on our
boat. So we made barricade of trunks
and merchandise along the guards, and
for the same caution, we anchored in the
channel at night, or tied up to STOW
heads" Thus we pass rivers, and forks,
and chutes, and Forts Peck and Carroll,
and plain frontier. Fort Benton salutes
US, where we score third thousand miles
on the Missouri.
| My friend was amazed by the idea of
the distance up our river into conti-
mental interior, and l thought he took
satisfaction that he was, after all, in my
office and not on that imagined steamer.
We had hoped for good stage of water
at Fort Benton, that we might run the
rapids there and 60 up to the very head
of steaming. So it happened to us in
our fiction, and ten volumes of it are more
easily written where you make your facts
as you 60 along than one where you must
work in only the obstinate, unsocal and
stupid facts that are already on hand.
The river became more and more
commonplace stream, as in the old coun-
try; the bottom and banks became more
daring as they almost touched our frail
keel and sometimes the bending trees
quite swept our decks, and once half
carried away the smoke stack. While
hoping and fearing for much more prog
re3s, we felt suddenly grating of the boat
as on shosl, and then jsrky, labored
stopping. We fastened to the bow to
see-hurrying to meet us-a noisy, fishing.
stream, like the Merrimack at Plymouth
or the Allegheny we'll above Pittsburg.
The trip was ended.
With what frmness he could muster,
my friend from the English island, about
four hundred miles in its largest diane
ter, said:
"How far up this river from the mouth
of the Mississippi Z"
"Shall / tell you gradually, or all at
once ?"
AT once the whole, for can hear any
thing now about the wonderful distances
and areas and other things remarkable in
this wonderful country"
| answered in measured and solemn
tones L" Forty.nine hundred and sixty
five miles"
He received the fact like scholar, and
l thought | detected the American pride
in country so recently his by adoption,
quickening and coloring his English blood.
should not have referred again to the
Thames, but that he spoke of it in the
way of apology, as being of good size for
an island. only added, as we turled
away from the map;
"The Thames is large river for an
island, and it floats much of the COM
merce of the World-more than Noah's