rolling prairie

Dictionary of American Words And Phrases by John Russell Bartlett.

The following excellent definition of this term is from the pen of Judge Hall:


"The vast plains or prairies of the West, although preserving a general level in respect to the whole country, are yet in themselves not flat, but exhibit a gracefully waving surface, swelling and sinking with an easy slope, and a full rounded outline, equally avoiding the unmeaning horizontal surface, and the interruption of abrupt or angular elevations. It is that surface which, in the expressive language of the country, is called rolling, and which has been said to resemble the long, heavy swell of the ocean, when its waves are subsiding to rest after the agitation of a storm. Such are rolling prairies."--Judge Hall, Notes on the Western States.

Dictionary of American Words And Phrases by John Russell Bartlett.

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