M 



CHAPTER SIXTEEN 



WESTERN EXPEDITIONS (CONT.) 



EXPEDITION OF 1 886 



Y fifth Western trip almost came to grief over the difficulties of 

 leadership, for it was imperative that I should be home before the 

 end of July and Speir could not leave his work in New York any earlier 

 than that. We finally agreed that I should take charge of the party for 

 the first four or five weeks and then that Speir should come out and 

 relieve me. The plan was for me to complete the unfinished work of 

 the year before in the Bridger country and then for Speir to take the 

 party over the Uinta Mountains into northern Utah, a long and toil- 

 some march to a very inaccessible region. The Uinta formation is in- 

 termediate in time between the Bridger of Wyoming and the White 

 River of South Dakota and very little was known of its fossils. We 

 were, therefore, most anxious to obtain a collection of Uinta fossils and 

 Speir was the man to do it. 



I was delighted by a suggestion from Professor Sloane that he should 

 join me for part of the trip and we travelled together as far as Jules- 

 burg, where he took the short line to Denver, then by the Rio Grande 

 Western to Salt Lake, from there turning back to Bridger, whither I 

 proceeded directly. I was very hospitably received, much more courte- 

 ously than the year before, and was very busily occupied in assem- 

 bling my transportation and equipment. When the students arrived, 

 we started, after only one night's delay, to our camp on Smith's Fork, 

 our almost invariable first station from the post. While we were eating 

 supper, Sloane drove up in a buckboard, much to my joy, as we hadn't 

 expected him for another day. He was the most jovial and helpful of 

 camp companions and all the students were so devoted to him that 

 they almost wept when he left us. 



The next day we moved to the Lone Tree camp on Henry's Fork, 

 where we had been so often before. Here there arose some delay owing 



