position nearly central with regard to the great plain of the Columbia, and also the lowest point in it, being only four hundred feet higher than the northern end of the Wallamet Valley, or very little more above the sea-level than the head of that valley, notwithstanding the general difference in elevation between the country east and west of the Cascade Range. The greater portion of the Walla Walla Valley belongs to Washington Territory; but a portion of it extends over into Oregon, and touches upon the Umatilla country, which it resembles.
The Government surveys have been extended over 820,000 acres. Of this, about 150,000 acres have been taken up, and about 20,000 acres more of unsurveyed lands settled upon. According to the census of 1870, the whole number of acres improved in the county of Walla Walla, in Washington Territory, is 63,377. Its population is seven thousand; and the valuation of property, real and personal, over three millions, with no county indebtedness. The stock statistics of 1870 show 5,787 horses, 1,727 mules, 14,114 neat cattle, 8,767 sheep, and 5,067 hogs. The cultivated land was divided, for that year, as follows: Wheat, 9,561 acres; oats, 5,317; barley, 1,314; timothy, 1,522; corn, 2,795; besides smaller crops of rye, buckwheat, etc. The number of fruit-trees in the county, 60,525; flouring-mills, eight; saw-mills, four. The grain crop, including wheat, Indian corn, barley, oats, and rye, for the year 1871, or the crop now in the ground, is estimated by the millers and others competent to judge, at one million bushels; and the fruit crop, for this year, much larger than ever before. These figures give a very flattering idea of an interior county only opened to settlement eleven years ago,
