Page:The first and last journeys of Thoreau - lately discovered among his unpublished journals and manuscripts 2.djvu/47

, very light-brown lines, alternating with broad (three times as broad) dark-brown lines or stripes,—the last having an interrupted line or square spot of the same color with the first mentioned, running down their middle; reminding me of the rude pattern of some Indian work,—porcupine quills, &quot;gopher-work&quot; in baskets and pottery.

The other, apparently the Missouri gopher, is thus described:

Larger, and indistinctly or finely barred or spotted with dark- and light-brown,—the hairs being barred so, -dark, -light, -dark. Both have feet like a marmot, and large pouches, and sit up by their holes like a woodchuck; the first is not shy.

Next Thoreau describes the towns visited, with the date of their settlement:

St. Anthony was settled about 1847; Minneapolis in 1851. Its main streets are the unaltered prairie, with bur and other oaks left standing. The roads on the prairie are