The first prairie we had ever seen was on the road between Detroit
and Kalamazoo; distant from the latter place only some eight or nine
miles. The axe had laid the country open in its neighborhood; but
the spot was easily to be recognized by the air of cultivation and
age that pervaded it. There was not a stump on it, and the fields
were as smooth as any on the plains of Lombardy, and far more
fertile, rich as the last are known to be. In a word, the beautiful
perfection of that little natural meadow became apparent at once,
though seated amid a landscape that was by no means wanting in
interest of its own.
We passed the night at the village of Kalamazoo; but the party of
females, with old Peter, proceeded on to Prairie Round, as that
particular part of the country is called in the dialect of Michigan,
it being a corruption of the old French name of la prairie ronde.
The Round Meadow does not sound as well as Prairie Round, and the
last being quite as clear a term as the other, though a mixture of
the two languages, we prefer to use it. Indeed, the word "prairie"
may now be said to be adopted into the English; meaning merely a
natural instead of an artificial meadow, though one of peculiar and
local characteristics.
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