12 Featherstonhaugh s Geological Report. 



and well-settled countries. The great contrast which the re 

 mote parts of this country present in this respect, is some 

 times not adverted to. My own opportunities are particularly 

 contrasted with those of the European geologists I have al 

 luded to. The Government conceiving itself authorized to 

 cause these geological reconnoissances to be made only in the 

 territories of the United States, my instructions are made out 

 conformably, and it becomes a matter of duty with me strictly 

 to obey them. The vast extent of the United States makes 

 it occasionally difficult to reach particular points, before the 

 season arrives when it is necessary to turn back to escape the 

 rigor of the winter. Such was the case during my excursion 

 last year. To the haste indispensable to the performance of 

 these distant excursions, may be added other serious inconve 

 niences, amongst which may be enumerated the want of ac 

 curate maps, and the wild state of the country on the borders 

 of and beyond the white population, where the acquisition 

 of correct topographical knowledge and the cares of self-pres 

 ervation become a very absorbing occupation. It is true 

 that expeditions of this character compensate to the geologist 

 the advantages he enjoys in other situations. He passes 

 through various countries, and enjoys rare opportunities of 

 comparing their mineral structure, and of tracing the exten 

 sive formations of the Western part of this country, but it 

 results from all these circumstances that, being obliged to deal 

 more with general than particular geology, he acquires the 

 habit of considering geology more upon the large than the 

 minute scale. Such is the case with myself, for although I 

 am not altogether debarred the opportunities of availing my 

 self of the details of formations which are new and interest 

 ing, and never neglect them, yet I have hitherto, in my 

 reports, thought it more consistent with my instructions gene 

 rally to suppress for the present, those sections which I have 

 made in localities out of the territories of the United States, 

 reserving them for an occasion when I hope ere long to pro- 



