BOUNDARIES OF DAKOTA.

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CHAPTER V.

DAKOTA.

BOUNDARIES, AREA AND TOPOGRAPHY OF DAKOTA-FIRST SETTLEMENTS ORGANIZATION - RIVERS-LAKES-DAKOTA DIVIDED INTO FOUR SECTIONS: NORTHERN, CENTRAL, SOUTHEASTERN AND BLACK HILLS--Characteristics OF EACH-THE BAD LANDS-FOSSILS THERE-GOVERNOR HOWARD'S DESCRIPTION OF THESE SECTIONS-GOVERNOR HOWARD'S ADDRESS HIS REPORT TO THE SECRETARY OF THE INTERIOR-BIOGRAPHICAL NOTICE OF Governor HOWARD THE SURVEYOR-GENERAL'S REPORT-NORTHERN DAKOTA-THE Description oF IT BY HON. JAMES B. Power-Charles Carleton Coffin's DESCRIPTION IN THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE-THE CORRESPONDENT OF THE CHICAGO JOURNAL OTHEr Testimony-Bishop Peck, Messrs. Reed and Pell-CenTRAL DAKOTA-THE ACCOUNT OF THE CHICAGO AND NORTHWESTERN RAILWAY COMMISSION-SOUTHEASTERN DAKOTA-REV. EDWARD ELLIS'S LETTER-HON. W. H. H. BEADLE's DescriptION-HIS COMPETENCY AS A WITNESS-METEOROLOGY OF SOUTHEASTERN DAKOTA-THE BLACK HILLS-Mr. Zimri L. White's DESCRIPTION OF THIS REGION-CLIMATE AND METEOROLOGY OF THE BLACK HILLS-GOLD-MINING THERE-FOUR CLASSES OF MINES-CHEAPNESS OF MINING AND MILLING-ALTITUDES IN THE BLACK HILLS-POPULATION OF TOWNS FARming, Grazing and MarkeT-GARDENING IN THE BLACK HILLS -SOCIAL LIFE AND MORALS THERE-RAILROADS IN DAKOTA-POPULATION OF THE TERRITORY AND ITS CHARACTER-THE FUTURE OF DAKOTA.

DAKOTA TERRITORY as now constituted lies between the parallels of 42° 30′ and 49° north latitude, and between the meridians of 96° 20' and 104 west longitude from Greenwich. There is also a small tract of about 2,000 square miles, lying between Montana, Idaho and Wyoming, of an irregular and partially triangular form, which was overlooked when Wyoming was organized, which belongs to Dakota, though no jurisdiction is exercised over it by the Territory, and it is at least 450 miles from its nearest boundary. This little tract is traversed by the Utah and Northern Railway, and includes a small slice of the Yellowstone Park. Dakota is bounded on the north by the Northwest British Territory and Manitoba, east by Minnesota and Iowa, south by Nebraska and the Missouri river, and west by Wyoming and Montana. Its area is 150,932 square miles, or 96,596,480 acres.

It is about 450 miles in length from north to south, and 350 miles from east to west.

The first settlements in the Territory were made in the southeast in 1859 in Yankton and vicinity, but were very few and scattering. It was first organized as as a Territory in 1861, containing then a vast territory, which has since been reduced by the organization of other Territories till, in 1868, it was reduced to its present area. The Missouri river traverses the Territory from Fort Buford in the northwest to Sioux City in the southeast, and is navigable for the whole distance. Its largest affluent, the Yellowstone, enters it opposite Fort Buford, just as it enters the Territory. The Missouri receives eleven or twelve large tributaries on the south side, and about the same number on the north side, within the limits of the Territory. The Red river of the North rises in Lake Traverse (latitude 46°), and flowing due north forms the eastern boundary of the Territory for more than 200 miles to the boundaries of Manitoba, and enters Lake Winnipeg in the northern part of that province. The Red river has two large affluents, the Pembina and the Sheyenne, and several smaller ones. The Souris or Mouse river, a tributary of the Assiniboine, one of the Canadian rivers, drains the northwestern part of the Territory. The Minnesota river, a tributary of the Mississippi, has its source in Big Stone lake, and several of its affluents rise in Southeastern Dakota.

Of the tributaries of the Missouri in Dakota, the principal on the north side are the Big Sioux, and the Dakota or James. The latter is nearly 400 miles in length, a river of considerable volume, but is not navigable in any part of its course. On the south side of the Missouri, the principal affluents are: the Niobrara, which forms the boundary between Nebraska and Dakota for a considerable distance, and its tributary, the Keyapaha; the White river, the Big Cheyenne, with its north and south forks (the former bearing also the name of La Belle Fourche), the Owl river, the Grand river, and the north and south forks of the Cannonball river, the Heart river, the Big Knife river and the Little Missouri. The whole Territory is well watered.

Dakota has very many lakes, some of them, like Lakes Minne

GOVERNOR HOWARD's report OF 1878.

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Waukan, Traverse, Big Stone, James, Kampeska, etc., of large size, and all of remarkable beauty.

Dakota was formerly divided into two or three distinct sections, and since the cession of the reservations of the Sioux and other Indian tribes a fourth has been added. Northeastern,

or perhaps more properly Northern Dakota, extends across the State fifty miles or more on either side of the Northern Pacific Railway, from the Red River valley to the bounds of Montana. It is, for the most part, a very fine wheat region. The soil is rich, deep and easily tilled, and yields large crops of the cereals, and of potatoes and other root crops. Central Dakota, the new division, includes much of the former Sioux reservation. This is also good land for the cereals, for Indian corn, the root crops, and some portions of it for grazing. The third section, Southeast Dakota, is almost wholly farming land, and along the river valleys and the plains, which extend back from them, there is no better land anywhere on the continent. The so-called Bad Lands (mauvaises terres) of Southern Dakota are of much less extent than has generally been supposed. They are entirely in this section, and there are but 75,000 acres (about three townships in all) of them. There is said to be another small tract in the northwest, but not much is known of them. The adjacent lands, though not so good for farming, are yet superior for grazing; and the Bad Lands themselves yield at least an ample crop of fossils.*

The late Hon. William A. Howard, Governor of Dakota and previously Governor of Michigan, in his report to the Secretary of the Interior, under date of December 16th, 1878, thus described three of these sections:

"The Territory of Dakota is very large, being nearly 400 miles square, or more than four times as large as the State of Ohio. The settlements are principally confined to three distinct localities as remote from each other as possible, and of very difficult and expensive communication with each other.

*In these Bad Lands have been discovered some of the most remarkable fossils yet found in America. The whole region is the cemetery of the extinct monsters of the cretaceous and earlier geologic ages.