_The Arkansas Plateau._--To the north of the Canadian River the region termed above the Great plateaus is less deeply dissected than in the portion of which the Llano is typical, and the streams from the mountains flow through shallow valleys with less rugged and less picturesque borders than those of the deep wide valleys of western Texas and eastern New Mexico. The broad plateau surfaces adjacent to the valleys of the Arkansas and Platte Rivers probably come nearer to the popular idea of the essential characteristics of the "Great plains" than any other of the larger divisions of the region under review. The most conspicuous geographic features of the Arkansas plateau have been described by W. D. Johnson as consisting of an assemblage of low and broad table-lands separated by shallow erosion valleys. The plateaus are immense unsculptured remnants in light relief of an older and originally perfect plain. The few long and feeble streams, wide apart and flowing eastward from the distant mountains in parallel courses and without tributaries, have blocked out by dissection the larger features of the broad landscape which in future ages will be slowly etched into a multitude of details. The scenery of these featureless plains is ordinarily depressing when once the novelty of being adrift on a sea of grass has passed away. There is nothing that can be termed scenery except that which once a year for a brief period the sky affords when clouds of extraordinary grandeur darken the air. Throughout nearly the entire annual course there is no material for landscape effect except the straight line of the horizon with a featureless breadth of sun-faded brown below it and above a merely broader space of faded blue. There is nowhere a curved line, and though as a scientific fact there is vast expanse of flat plain, there is little to suggest it when the sky is empty of clouds. In June the clouds come with a gradual maturing at some point along the even sky-line, and increase rapidly until the heavens are filled with magnificent vapour banks; but the display is simply spectacular, and passes away in a few hours as quickly as it came, with only local showers to refresh the land. The one industry that can thrive on the Arkansas plateau, which was formerly at certain seasons blackened by herds of bison, is stock-raising. Wells from which water is pumped by windmills furnish sufficient water for herds of cattle and horses, but not for irrigation.