The country has now perhaps been _sufficiently described_; and though I have doubtless been a little _tiresome_ in _minutiæ_, I _hope_ at least to have succeeded in giving my readers a _good idea_ of the great _prairie-land_, and can now perhaps _successfully_ explain the subject of _stock-raising_ which is so extensively carried on there, and a business that leads in occidental occupations. It has already been said that the rivers and streams and little lakes that dampen the sands of this great wilderness are nearly all watering-places for the herds that range along their banks. It now yet remains to explain how the business is _conducted_, as any person can see the positive necessity of some _system_ where the country is so large and unfenced, and where there are so many owners and such great herds. Sometimes a herd is owned by one _individual_, but _usually_ there are _companies_; and often one firm owns forty and fifty thousand cattle. It would of course be impossible to stable or feed these vast numbers, and they are left upon the prairie the year round, and never even get salt. They _usually_ keep in pretty good _order_ during the winter; but when much snow falls and the grass is covered for some time, and the weather is very cold, thousands of them die. Poor and weak, they stand upon the railroad-track and are knocked off in great numbers. Of course these winters are _unusual_; and the profits are so large that a few cattle dying now and then is but a momentary break in the financial stream.