THE SHERMAN ASTRONOMICAL EXPEDITION. 73 



while an elevation of 8,000 feet leaves more than a fourth of the atmos- 

 phere below it. The situation was one of remarkable natural beauty. 

 On the east there was little to mark the altitude except the rocky- 

 soil and scanty vegetation ; on the north there were picturesque piles 

 of granite ; on the north-west lay the Laramie Hills ; from the north- 

 west to the south towered the mountain-peaks, many of them covered 

 with perpetual snow. Long's Peak and Gray's Peak were 60 miles 

 away at the south ; the great mass of Medicine Bow lay at the west, 

 and between them, over the lower ridges, rose some of the high moun- 

 tains of the Colorado parks. 



The party being located, and all arrangements for observation be- 

 ing made as systematic as possible, work was carried on during the 

 summer months in earnest, and attended with valuable results for the 

 initiatory movement of a work of such magnitude. The weather proved 

 to be unusually unfavorable. An old trapper, who had lived among 

 the mountains for twenty years, said that the amount of cloudy and 

 rainy weather was uncommon for the season. With the exception of 

 a week, when every night and a gi*eater part of ever day were fine, 

 clear nights were rare, and clear days less so. There were but two af- 

 ternoons when work upon the sun could be kept up from noon till sun- 

 set, though there were more than twenty cloudless mornings during 

 the same time. The enormous snow-fall of the preceding winter ac- 

 counted for the unusual weather-condition of the locality, and the 

 snow, in the middle of July, was still lying to the depths of eight feet 

 on the plateau at the base of the Medicine Bow Mount. 



Notwithstanding these drawbacks, valuable scientific results were 

 obtained in five different departments of observation, geographical, 

 meteorological, telescopic, spectroscopic, and magnetic. 



The geographical position of the station was completely deter- 

 mined, its longitude being obtained by telegraphic communication 

 with Salt Lake City. It will, therefore, be for the future a reference- 

 point and base for the numerous surveys which are being made in that 

 part of the country. 



A complete hourly meteorological record was obtained for nearly 

 the whole of the months of June, July, and August, which, from the 

 important position of the station, cannot fail to be of great interest 

 and value. 



The telescopic observations were full of promise for the result of 

 future and more thorough work in that department. When the sky 

 was unclouded the atmosphere possessed the most ethereal transpar- 

 ency. At night, myriads of stars invisible at lower elevations were 

 plainly discernible. Nearly all the seventh-magnitude stars of the 

 British Association Catalogue were clearly visible to the naked eye. 

 Prof. Young, to whose report we are indebted for the facts recorded 

 in this article, says that, in the quadrilateral forming the bowl of the 

 " Dipper," he could see distinctly nine stars, with glimpses of one or 



