The daily morning journal and courier., 1897-05-01
DAKOTA's sNOWDRIFTs.
Continued from Tenth Page.)

of Minneapolis, Northwestern superin- tendent of the American Express com pany. With several employees of the company and company of South Da- kOta militia guarding the treasure it was conveyed in a lump from Huron to Pierre. After the Populsts had count ed it MT. Daniel started back with the treasure, but the train was caught in blizzard at Highmore, half way between Pierre and Huron. For five long days the train lay in the drifts, with it's two hundred thousand dollars and guards, to say nothing of the passengers. They were days of nerve strain for MT Dan iel, who was responsible for the money, but the snow ploughs at last broke through the drifts.
 If it were not for the way the snow fills up in the cuts, blockades, even after the heaviest snowfalls, would not last long before the modern rotary snow ploughs, which clear the track from heavy snow at the rate of fifteen miles an hour. The trouble Is that in the deep cuts the walls of snow thrown up by the rotaries on each side of the track eventually reach such a height that the snow falls back when it is shot out from the cutting knives of the TO- tary. In an ordinary winter that never happens. But this winter, when four and five feet of snow have fallen in places and the wind had heaped it into drifts fifteen and twenty feet high, the deep cuts, after being opened by the rotaries, have become choked up In such cuts there is nothing to do but re- inforce the snow ploughs with trains of flatcars and gangs of shoVellers. The surplus snow is thrown on to the cars and drawn out of the cuts. In some places in the Dakotas trains are now running through cuts between solid walls of snow as high as the coaches and not more than five or six inches from their sides.
 If the railroads have suffered, what shall be said of the country wagon roads and of the farmers? In some cases communication with towns has been entirely cut off except by means of skids. There has been so much snow that during the winter there was a gen. eral revival of the pastime of snow boating These snow boats are simply light, three-runner sleighs, which are rigged with big sails exactly like those of sailboats.
 In Harlem township, near Foreman, N. D., there is a snoWbank thirty five feet in height. This monster drift ac- cumulated over a farmers well. To draw water the farmer has been com pelled to add thirty-five feet of tubing to the well.
 At Havana, N. D., the sloping roof of a large warehouse is the upper part of a splendid toboggan slide, which is ex- tended by drifts overlapping the roof. In this neighborhood windmill on a twenty-foot tower was completely cov- cred by the snow, and the owner had to remove ten feet of snow to get to it.. Several cases have been reported of stock walking on to the roofs of snow covered barns and falling through. In dozens of cases farmers and villagers have been compelled to come from their houses through second story win
 
 farmers have been compelled to make cuts through the snow to get to the doors of their houses and barns. To those who have not travelled through the northwest this winter these stories seem incredible, but if the snow fall as officially recorded by the local United States weather observers is tal lxo,1 mt to if ic oor1y to see that they are not exaggera tions. At Minneapolis the records of the weather office show that fifty-three inches of snow have fallen, and that until within few days there were twenty-two inches of closely packed snow on the level still on the ground. In many places in the Dakotas five stretches of country it lies at depth of three or four feet Strong winds blow ing such quantities of snow soon pile up enormous drifts.
 The old ''bucking" type of plOuehs is still used where the snow is not deep. but the main reliance is placed in the rotaries. In brief, the rotary plough
 
 car, which has at it's forward end a se- ries of revolving spiral knives, which bore their way into the snow as a bit does into a board. In this car is a | powerful stationary engine which whirls the knives at the rate of three hundred and sixty revolutions min ute. The plough, with it's knives whirling. is pushed into the snow by | two engines. Where the snow is not more than four or five feet deep the i plough is able to travel along at the rate of from six to ten miles an hour, without stopping and backing up to 1 buck. The knives draw the snow into 1 shafts on either side of the plough. | from which it is shot out with great velocity and to a considerable distance. A rotary plough passing through a deep | drift makes a splendid spectacle as it throws out great columns of snow i which mix with the smoke from the en- l gines.-Minneapolis Letter in the Chi i cago Record.
 i She-"How do you account for the enormous increase of the English spar row in America? 9" He-"They're too ! TsrIy- to on or7 yvor,ar,,. E,s+sr C-J,ico-~,