Great Falls tribune. [volume] (Great Falls, Mont.) 1885-1890, 1886-12-18
THE ROCKIES.

1t will be remembered that the French
men who discovered the Rocky mountains
in. f140 gave them that name in commem-
Grafton Of their disappointment in not find
ing them glistening with gold as reputed
by the Indians whom they encountered on
their voyage, and who called them the
Shining mountains" 1t seems however
that they have borne the more poetic if
less ~pronouncable, appellation of the
"Chippewyan mountains as appears from
Irying's beautiful description of them,
which will no doubt be interesting for our
readers to review in these columns. Mr..
Irving says, in substance. The mountain
which now lowered above them (the Astor
| party was n of the Big Horn Chain,
bordered by a river of the same name, ana
extending for a long distance rather east
of north ard west of south. 1t is a part of
the great system Of Granite mountains
which forms n of the most important
and striking features of North America,
stretching parallel with the coast of the
Pacific from the isthmus of Panama almost
to the Attic ocean, and presenting a cor
responding chain TO that of the Andes in
the Southern Hemisphere. This vast
range has acquired from its rugged and
broken character, and its SUBMITS Of max
ed granite, the appellation Of the Rocky
mountains, a name BY no means distinctive,
as all elevated ranges are rocky. Among
the early explorers it was known as the
range Of Chippewyan mountains, and this
Indian name is the one it IS likely to re-
tain in poetic usage. Rising from the
midst Of vast plains ana prairies, travers-
ing several degrees of latitude. dividing
the waters of the Atlantic and the Pacific,
and seeming to bind, with diverging ridges,
the level regions on its TANKS, it has been
figuratively termed the back bone of the
Northern Continent. The Rocky mount
aims do not present a range of uniform ell
ovation, but rather groups and occasion
ally detached peaks. Though some OF
these rise to the region of perpetual SHOWS,
and are upward Of 1900 feet in real alti-
tude, yet their height from their imme-
date basis is not so great as might be
imagined, as they swell up from elevated
plains, several thousand feet above the
level Of the ocean. These plains are of
ten of a desolate sterility, but extensive
plains likewise occur among the higher
regions of the mountains, of considerable
fertility. Indeed, these lofty plats of table
land seem to form a peculiar feature in
the American Continents. Some occur
among the Cordilleras of the Andes, where
cities and towns and cultivated farms are
to be seen 5000 feet above the level OF the
sea. The Rocky mountains, as we have
already observed, occursingly or in groups,
and occasionally in collateral ridges. Be
tween these are deep valleys, with small
streams winding through them, which find
their way into the lower plains. augment
ing as they proceed, and ultimately dis
charging themselves into those vast rivers
which traverse the prairies like great art
cries and drain the continent.
While the granite SUBMITS OF the Rocky
mountains are bleak and bare, many of
the inferior ridges ars clothed with scrub
bed pine. oaks, cedar, and burze. Various
parts of the mountains also bear traces of
volcanic action. Some of the interior val
leys are streWd with scoria and broken
stones, evidently of volcanic origin; the
surrounding rocks bear the like character,
and vestiges of e~xtinguished craters are to
be seen on the elevated heights. This i'm
range Of mountains, which divides
all that the Indians know of the world and
which gives birth to such mighty rivers, |
is to them an object of awe and veneration.
They call it the 'crest of the world" and
think that Waeondah, or the master of life
as they designate the Supreme Being, has
his residence among the aerial heights.
The tribes on the eastern prairies call them
the mountains of the setting n Some
Of them place the .happy hunting
grounds" their ideal paradise, among the
of these mountains; but say they
ire invisible to living men. Here also is
he LAND of Souls" in which are the
towns of the free and generous spirits,n'