Page 9 - Keays Diary with forward 1866 and Cover

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Wednesday night at Gitard Station.

Marysville May 3 -- We are at 10 o'clock Thursday at the Big

Blue River in the edge of Nebraska; there is quite a village here and

it is quite a fine location; I should think, if there was only more

timber, there is no reason why this is not as fine a farming country as

there is.

It is worth the trouble of coming so far, to see such a vast

stretch of country and not a sign of improvements as far as one can see.

There is quite an amount of stone here, several of the houses

are built of it and it looks very nicely.

There are some bad people here as the population is slim;

there is a jail in every town. Here, they are just bui1ding a very stout

one of stone.

The grass is fine for food but so far we do no use it but get

hay.
Came 26 miles at one-half past three -- camped Thursday night

at Cotton Wood Creek, had a nice snug place all to ourselves; we made

up bread this morning to bake tonight. We had lots of fun over it, nearly

everyone of us got on the bread some time during the day, but it came cut

all right and made the nicest biscuit and light bread, the first we had.

We have come to the conclusion that if we could have as nice

places to camp, and weather and roads, we should not mind traveling all

the time. We think Nebraska is not so very far away as we had thought and

wonder very much that it does not settle up faster. The Rig Blue River is

a very beautiful stream, it every appearance of good country but perhaps

the soil is clayey.