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The limitation laws are similar to those of Ohio, except as to foreign indebtedness, which, if not contracted for property coming to Montana, or for passage thither, can not be collected after the lapse of three months from the time the liability accrued.

MONTANA MINES.-Montana is very promising, richer, it is said, than any other gold or silver States or Territories. The placer diggings are paying largely, and the quartz seems to be richer than a great many others, and a great many mills are going in.

Alder Gulch is the theater of the original and most extensive goldmining in Montana. Virginia City is the first and largest town here. About thirty millions of gold have been taken in the various diggings of the gulch, and the quartz mines at its head among the hills are now very popular and promising. The present population of the Alder Gulch region is about 14,000. About 140 miles north and east, more immediately among the Rocky Mountains, and on their eastern slopes, a rich gulch was recently discovered, called the "Last Chance," near which there sprung into existence in a few months the populous mining town of Helena City. The neighboring valleys and gulches were also found to be rich in gold and silver, both washings and quartz. Many millions of treasure have already been obtained from this section of the Territory. The country is described as picturesque and beautiful. It is watered by the head-streams of the Missouri River, the Jefferson and Gallatin Rivers, and their tributaries; and Fort Benton, the head of navigation on the Missouri River, is but 175 miles east from Helena.

The gold discoveries next extended across the mountains to the headwaters of the Blackfoot, where some important deposits have been opened. East of the Missouri River, during the summer of 1865, discoveries were made at Confederate Gulch, where Diamond City, containing four to five thousand inhabitants, has since gathered. It is reported that the deposits there are of great richness. Gold lodes occur every-where in connection with gold diggings. One of the best gold-lode mining districts is on Madison River, in what is called the Hot Spring district.

The ores of Montana are reported by scientific men to be much richer than those of California, which yield an average of $20 per ton. The great majority of the lodes of Montana promise an average of four times that amount. There are few sulphurets of iron and copper carrying gold in Montana, such as prove so troublesome in Colorado. This is owing to the fact that the formation is so open and perforated by water that the sulphurets have been decomposed. For the same reason miners in Montona are not troubled with water, and are saved the heavy expenses of pumping.

The silver ores are in the form of argentiferous galena, which must be smelted, as Western lode ores are, and the silver separated from the lead by cupellation. The silver ores are much more trustworthy than those yielding gold; and experience has already shown that silvermining will be in Montana more profitable than gold-mining. The veins are more uniform in the yield and last better. The large and

continual supply of water is of immense benefit to mining operations in Montana, as well as the facility of movement, the country everywhere abounding in natural roads, which do not easily become broken up. The veins of copper ore have been traced for a great extent, and the ores are found to yield from 33 to 65 per cent. But little attention is as yet given to this metal, as gold and silver monopolize the time and care of the people.

EMIGRATION TO MONTANA.-Montana, like Idaho, presents great inducements to emigrants, and her population, estimated in 1865 at considerably over thirty thousand, is composed, in great measure, of the men who built up Colorado so rapidly, and who, upon the exhaustion of the surface deposits, left that Territory for the richer diggings just discovered in the north. When her placers become exhausted, of which there 'seems no immediate probability, Montana must undoubtedly exert a temporary diminution of her population; but in the development of her gold-bearing quartz veins, of which the number is almost incalculable, she will have the elements of a steady and permanent increase. The population at present centers around the mining towns of Virginia City, Helena, and Diamond City.

One of the most surprising geographical facts about Montana is, that it is reached by steamboats from St. Louis. Travelers and freight are transported by steamboat, and, without transhipment, from St. Louis to Fort Benton in the heart of Montana, and freights, in the proper season of navigation, can be got to Montana quicker than to Denver City. This cheap mode of communication will be of vast importance to the new Territory, and light-draught boats will insure speed and safety. The river voyage from St. Louis to Fort Benton is made in twenty-eight days, and freight is carried at ten cents per pound.

TOWNS AND SETTLEMENTS.-The principal towns and settlements in Montana are the following: Virginia City and Gallatin are situated in the original mining district in the south-west portion of the Territory. The former is the largest town in the Territory, and its present capital. Its population is estimated at ten thousand, though, like that of most other mining towns, it is probably variable. Helena, on the Missouri River, 175 miles from Fort Benton, is the center of a rich mining region, and has seven or eight thousand inhabitants. Silver City, in the same section, is a growing and prosperous town. Bannock City, the former capital of the Territory, is in the south-west corner, among the mountains, and on the head-waters of the Missouri.

Fort Benton, an important military post, is situated on the north side of the Missouri River, in latitude 47° 20', and longitude 109° 45'. It is about ten miles below the Great Falls.

RIVERS. The Missouri River is formed in the south-west portion of Montana Territory by the confluence of the Wisdom and Jefferson. Its course is north and east, passing out of Montana near its northeast corner into the Territory of Dakota. The following branches of the Missouri are altogether or partially within the bounds of Montana: Madison, Gallatin, Medicine, Bear's or Maria's, with its principal branch the Leton, Milk River, and the Yellowstone, with its

principal branches, the Big Horn, the Rosebud, Tongue, and Powder Rivers.

Clark's Fork of the Columbia River is formed in the western portion of Montana by the commingling of the Blackfoot and Hell-gate streams and running a north-westerly direction, passes into the north-west par' of Idaho. The Flathead River, a branch of Clark's Fork, rises in the north-west part of Montana, and runs north through Flathead Lake. Flatbone River, which rises in the British Possessions and runs into Montana, passes through its north-west corner back into British Columbia.

The Yellowstone River, taking its rise among the mountains in the western or south-western portion of Montana, drains with its numerous tributaries nearly the whole of the central and eastern portion of Montana, as well as of the south-western section of Dakota. It collects the waters of the small streams which flow between the Black Hills and the Rocky Mountains. Its general course is east and north-west, crossing the boundary line between Montana and Dakota, and entering the Missouri a short distance east of that line. It is eight hundred yards wide at its mouth, or about equal in size to the Missouri at the point of junction.

INDIAN TERRITORY.

THIS is a tract of country set apart by the Government of the United States as a permanent home for the aboriginal tribes removed thither from east of the Mississippi River, as well as those indigenous to the territory. It is bounded on the north by Colorado and Kansas, south by Missouri and Texas, (from which it is partly separated by Red River,) east by Arkansas, and west by Texas and New Mexico. Indian Territory lies between 33° 30' and 37° north latitude, and between 94° 30′ and 100° west longitude, being about 320 miles long and from 35 to 220 miles in width, including an area of perhaps 65,127 square miles. The recently formed State of Kansas and a portion of the south of Nebraska were constituted from territory originally included within the so-called Indian Territory.

FACE OF THE COUNTRY.-There is a general inclination of the country from the base of the Rocky Mountains on the western border of Indian Territory, toward the Mississippi River, with a slight inclination to the south-east. A vast, barren, and sandy tract, generally known as the Great American Desert, occupies the north-west portion of the Territory. The rest of the Territory spreads out, for the most part, into undulating plains of great extent, with the exception of the Ozark or Washita Mountains, which enter the east portion of the Indian Territory from Arkansas. This territory, however, has been too imperfectly explored to enable us to speak with great precision of its surface.

RIVERS-Indian Territory is drained by the Arkansas and Red Rivers, with their tributaries; these all have their sources among or near the Rocky Mountains, and flowing in an east or south-east direction, across or on the borders of the Territory, discharge their waters into the Mississippi. None of these rivers have their source within the Territory. The Red River forms part of the south boundary, while the Arkansas passes through Indian Territory into the State of the same name. The tributaries of the Arkansas are the Cimarron, Neosha, Verdigris, and the North and South Forks of the Canadian; those of the Red River are the Washita, False Washita, and Little Red River; all having nearly an east course, except the Neosha, which runs south. These rivers have generally broad and shallow channels, and in the dry season are little more than a series of sandy pools; in the winter and spring only are they navigable by flatboats and canoes, or for steamboats (if at all) near their mouths. The Arkansas and Red Rivers are both navigable for steamboats, but to what distance we are not accurately informed. The Arkansas has a course of about 2,000 miles, and Red River of 1,200 miles.

CLIMATE. Of the climate we have little definite information, but that of the eastern portion is probably similar to the climates of Arkansas and Missouri, on which it borders. The summers are long and extremely dry, the days being very hot, with cool nights.

SOIL AND PRODUCTIONS.-On this point our information is limited. The east portion, occupied by the partly-civilized Indians, is represented as fertile prairie land, interspersed "with mountain and flat hills," for an extent of 200 miles westward from the boundary of Arkansas. On the borders of the streams are strips of woodland, mostly cotton-wood and willows; the country is, however, generally destitute of timber. The Cross Timbers, thus described by Captain Marcy, are partly in this Territory: "A narrow strip of woodland, called the Cross Timbers, from 5 to 30 miles wide, extending from the Arkansas River some 500 miles in a south-west direction to the Brazos, divides the arable land from the great prairies, for the most part arid and sterile." The north-west portion of the Territory is mostly a barren, dreary waste "of bare rocks, gravel, and sand," destitute of all vegetation, except, perhaps, a few stunted shrubs, "yuccas, cactuses, grape-vines, and eucurbitaceous plants." The water is brackish, and the surface in many places covered with saline efflorescenses. The eastern prairies are well adapted to grazing, and the products of the adjoining States flourish there. Vast herds of buffaloes and wild horses roam over its prairies, and antelope, deer, prairie-dog, and some other animals are found; wild turkeys, grouse, etc., are among the birds.

Taken as a whole, probably no portion of the country of equal extent within the territorial limits of the United States is better adapted to stock-raising than the country owned by the Indians. Prior to the late civil war, they had engaged in the business extensively, and many of them owned herds of cattle numbered by thousands.

INHABITANTS.-This Territory is chiefly inhabited by immigrant Indians of various tribes and nations, and to some extent by indige

nous tribes. The Cherokees were originally settled in the north, the Creeks and Seminoles in the middle, and the Choctaws and Chickasaws in the south. In the north-east, between the Neosha River and the eastern boundaries, are small remnants of several tribes, as the Quapaws, Senecas, etc.; and the western and other portions are roamed over by the Osages, Camanches, Kioways, Pawnees, Araphoes, and other nomad tribes. The several immigrant nations, as the Choctaws, Cherokees, Creeks and Seminoles, have had distinct and separate districts allotted and marked out by treaty, with boundaries specially defined, each with its own government, subject to the eminent sovereignty of the United States. Now, the several nations form distinct communities. Some of the removed tribes have made considerable advances in agriculture and the industrial arts, and have established schools and churches, while others are relapsing into indolence and vagrancy, and following the common fate of the savage when in contact with the civilized man, are fast diminishing under the influence of intemperance and vicious connections with abandoned whites.

According to the United States census of 1860, the Choctaw nation numbered within its bounds 3,166 persons; the Cherokee, 3,234; the Creek, 2,247; and the Chickasaw, 1,076. These four nations had at that time 7,369 slaves. Other tribal Indians made the aggregate population of the Territory 65,680. The capital is Taklequah.

Indian Territory forms a part of the great Louisiana tract purchased by President Jefferson from France in 1803. The United States Government have military stations at Fort Gibson, on the Arkansas; Fort Towson, on the Red; and Fort Washita on the Washita. The Territory of Kansas, with a portion of Nebraska, was formed from what was formerly called Indian Territory, in 1854.

THE PACIFIC RAILROAD.

UNDER date of San Francisco, August 20, 1865, the author of the work, "Across the Continent," to which we have several times referred in the second part of this volume, writes as follows. We extract freely on this great national topic of absorbing interest, and to none more so than to the people of the West, and to those designing settlement in the new and growing States and Territories between the Missouri and the Pacific:

"It is touching to remember that between Plains and Pacific, in country and on coast, on the Columbia, on the Colorado, through all our long journey, the first question asked of us by every man and woman we have met, whether rich or poor, high or humble, has been, 'When do you think the Pacific Railroad will be done?' or, 'Why do n't or won't the Government, now the war is over, put the soldiers to building this road? and their parting appeal and injunction, as well, 'Do

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