Science beyond the Rocky Mountains 175 



meteorologist. Better information is much to be desired re- 

 garding the natural history (and the geography as well) of 

 Sonora, Arizona and the head of the Gulf of California; but 

 though governments have been established there, yet the troubled 

 state of the country through the interminable Apache and 

 Comanche wars renders travelhng anything but safe. Accordingly 

 nothing has been done in that vicinity of great importance since 

 the expedition of Ives, the Mexican Boundary Commission, and 

 the Pacific Railroad Survey. There appears, however, to be some 

 stray collectors there, for parcels of plants, &c., are occasionally 

 arriving at the California Academy's rooms from that country. 



(2.) Oregon, Washington Territory, Mo7itana, and Idaho. 



I wish I could make an equally satisfactory report regarding the 

 broad quartette of partially-explored, and thinly-peopled states and 

 territories embraced under this heading. I know of scarcely one 

 naturalist resident in these countries, and what has been done has 

 been by transitory visitors; and in Idaho and Montana, notwithstand- 

 ing the visits of Townsend, Douglas, and others, there is still a good 

 deal to be done in zoology and the botany of herbaceous plants. 

 There are, however, one or two solitary individuals amid the 

 rude backwoodsmen^mining population, trappers, rowdies, and 

 ruffians — which compose the bulk of the population of these terri- 

 tories, particularly the latter two, by whom the wandering naturalist 

 would be intelligently appreciated, such as Dr Thompson and 

 Colonel Drew in Jacksonville, Rogue River, both of whom, though 

 not scientific men in the strict sense of the phrase, are yet exceed- 

 ingly intelligent collectors of minerals, antiquities (of the Indians), 

 &c. ; and at the Dalles of the Columbia resides the Rev. Mr Conton, 

 a very enthusiastic geologist and successful collector. 



In Washington territory, Mr J. G. Swan (author of " Three 

 Years in Washington Territory "), resides at Neah Bay, diligent 

 in collecting specimens, and ^not neglectful of his duties as a 

 teacher of the Indians. At Whatcom, Mr Bennett " picks up" any- 

 thing he thinks of interest, and sends to the all-engrossing " Smith- 

 sonian."* My good friend, the Rev. Father Cherouse of Snoqualami 



* In relation to this, I may remark that, wherever I went in Washington Ter- 

 ritory, even among the rudest backwoodsmen, I found, at least, three literary 

 documents, viz., a pack of cards, a quack medicine advertising almanack, and a 

 Smithsonian Institute Report ; and to the influence of the latter may be traced 

 that intelligent appreciation of science so universal there. 



