into two camps, and are known in their country under the name of Skalzi. One of these camps, numbering about 300, inhabits sometimes the neighborhood of the great Flathead lake, and sometimes the great Tobacco Plain, which is watered by the Kootenai river; the distance is seventy miles. The Tobacco Plain is a remarkable spot, situated between the forty-ninth and fiftieth degrees of north latitude, and is the only great plain possessed by this camp. It it about fifty or sixty miles long by fifteen or twenty miles in width. It resembles a large basin, surrounded by lofty mountains, which form a vast and beautiful amphitheatre and present a picturesque sight. The plain has all the appearance of the dry bed of a vast lake. Toward the south the valley is gravelly, undulating and covered with little hillocks, and patches here and there are susceptible of cultivation; the northern portion, on the contrary, has a uniform surface and a considerable extent of excellent arable land.
Though the land is very elevated, and far toward the north, the temperature is remarkably mild, severe cold being a rare occurrence, and the snow is seldom deep; it falls frequently during the season, but disappears almost as it falls, absorbed, perhaps, by the rarefaction of the atmosphere at this elevation, or perhaps driven off by the southern breeze, which blows almost uninterruptedly in the valley and drives the snow off as it falls. Horses and horned cattle find abundant pasture during the whole year.
The large river, called indifferently the Kootenai, the McGillivray, and the Flat-bow river, flows through the entire valley. It rises to the northwest of this region, and its course is toward the southeast for a considerable distance. The waters of this great river are increased by a large number of brooks and beautiful rivulets, which have their source, for the most part, in the lovely lakes or numerous basins of these beautiful mountains. Many of these streams present to the eye the most charming scenes in their course. The noise of their waters and the sweet murmur