102 THE REPORT OF THE No. 19 



furnished the larger part of the specimens, besides having at one end the huge siUcified trunk 

 of a Sequoia tree, which some parties had attempted to saw in pieces to carry oft' ; apparently 

 it proved too severe a task, as the work had been abandoned half finished. Our camp was 

 within pistol shot of this hill'jck, in a little grove of evergreens overlooking the ancient 

 Florissant lake-basin where the fossils were entombed, and so we could give all day to the 

 work. Moreover, as on previous visits I had made a careful study of the spot and noted the levels 

 yielding best results, little had to be done in the way of prospecting. The pick brought out 

 great slabs which, to uncover the fossils, we proceeded carefully to split with knives and 

 geological hammers, seated side by side in the dirt. In this way we obtained many 

 hundred specimens in a day, while some men ftet at work in some deeper quarries a mile 

 away brought us at the end of our stay what they had exhumed. Each day's pile was 

 caref uly stored in a "afe place, and a day at the last given up to packing. 



Our cook proved so good in his special line and such a helpful worker with die pick, that 

 we engaged him for the new move the boys were most eager for. Some years before, one of 

 Dr. Hayden's survey parties had discovered in some rocks of about the same age as those at 

 Florissant certain fossil leaves which were identical in species with those found with the insects 

 at Florissant. This was on the summit of the Roan mountains or Book Cliffs, riistant some 

 two hundred miles, but still in Colorado. From that point, moreover, it was but thirty miles 

 in a direct line across the mountains to a place where fossil insects themselves had been found 

 in the valley of the White River, though nobody had been able to rediscover the precise 

 locality, and the original explorer was dead. That it was beyond the settled country only 

 excited the enthusiasm of my companions, and so our pecking party around the Florissant 

 hillock spent much time in planning the expedition we finally undertook. 



This was in 1889. We made our way to Grand Junction by rail and there procured a simple 

 '"outfit" in the shape of a two-hux'se team, an extra horse and saddles. Our cook was our 

 teamster, and loaded with provisions we pushed out from Grand Junction late in the afternoon 

 of July 12th and camped by the roadside twelve miles on, passing Frulta on the way. By noon 

 of the next day our road left Grand River and headed for the mountains and we reached the 

 last ranch in Salt Creek by nightfall. The close of another day, in which we passed a band of 

 Ttes, found us camped in the woods on the summit of the Roan mountains bj' Clifl:' Springs, a 

 meagre enough trickling affair, but the only water for miles about. 



Here we spent a week, discovered with little doubt the spot where the fossil leaves had 

 been found, but with them no insects. At several other points however, and especially at one 

 place about five miles from camp, we found an exceediuQrly rich deposit of insects, very easily 

 worked. This locality was a charming one. At the height of nearly nine thousand feet and 

 at the very brink of a precipitous descent of more than two thousand feet, one looked beyond 

 the deeply cut ravines to the distant plains, through which the Grand River forces its way. 

 We had to work on the slope of the precipice, cutting footholds for our security from slipping. 

 We had also to walk back to camp, using our beasts as pack animals and following the Indian 

 trail along the brink of the precipitous clifl^ ; at times this passed throuoh a dense chapparal, 

 where it was difficult to get through without unlading, or injury to our treasures ; at others it 

 ran a little below the brink of the precipice along the talus by a scarcely marked path , where 

 thu rubbish loosened by our tread rolled and fell, many hundred feet below. Once, in the most 

 critical spot, a violent storm of hail struck us and whirling about with no regard whatever to 

 our shelving footing, the animals all turned tail to the wind like weathercocks, facing down 

 hill, and nearly set us rolling down the stee[) embankment ; nor would they budge till all was 

 over. 



We were shortly visited at our camp by some of the Utes, inclu ling the Indian Police, 

 suspicious of hammers and picks in such close vicinity of the Indian reservation, still more 



