52 



means of a Mackinac boat, and carefully examine all points on the 

 river to determine their suitahility as sites for military posts, and to 

 obtain such other information as we should be able with regard to 

 the country. An escort of fifteen men and two non-commissioned 

 officers of the 2d infantry were placed under my command. We left 

 Fort Pierre in the American Fur Company's boat " St. Mary," Cap- 

 tain Labarge, on the 28th of June, and reached Fort Union on the 

 10th of July.' The boat landed most of her stores, and then proceeded 

 to a point about 60 miles above the mouth of the Yellowstone and 

 discharged the balance. 



While ascending the river, tlie sketch of it was taken above Fort 

 Pierre, as it had been below, by Messrs. Hutton and Snowden, and 

 observations were made by me for latitude. At Fort Union a 16-inch 

 transit was set up, and observations taken during a whole lunation; 

 but owing to the cloudy condition of the nights during the time, and 

 the shortness of the nights themselves, only two sets of observations 

 were obtained on the moon and stars. The result of these gave the 

 longitude of tViat post 101° 02', with a limit of error of about 10'. 



While at Fort Union we saw the Assinniboin Indians. 



Having ascertained that a Mackinac boat could not be prepared for 

 me before the 1st of September, I determined to make an examination 

 of the Yellowstone during the month of August; and in carrying this 

 out I was fortunate in being able to purchase the means of land trans- 

 portation from Sir St. George Gore, who was returning from an ex- 

 ten ;ive hunting excursion on the waters of the Yellowstone and its 

 br inches. We left the mouth of the Yellowstone July 25, and, 

 trnvelling leisurely up the left bank, reached a point one hundred 

 miles from its mouth, beyond which it was impossible to advance with 

 wagons along the valley of the Yellowstone without crossing to the 

 opposite banks. Here we made a camp with the main body, and with 

 a party of seven I proceeded, with pack animals, over a very difficult 

 country (known as the Bad Lands of the Yellowstone) to the mouth of 

 Powder river, thirty miles further. 



This was the furthest point up the Yellowstone that I intended to 

 proceed, and I was anxious to reach it and to fix its position, as being 

 a good and certain point with which any future reconnaissance could 

 connect. From the appearance of Powder river at the mouth, no 

 one would suppose the stream to be of the length it really is, and I 

 was not surprised at Captain Clarke not having done so on his 

 voyage down the Yellowstone in 1806. On returning to our wagon 

 camp, we all travelled a short distance down the Yellowstone to a 

 convenient point, where we made a boat eighteen feet long and five 

 feet wide, by stretching the skins of three buffalo bulls over a frame 

 made of small cotton-wood and willow trees. With this vessel a 

 small party navigated the Yellowstone to its mouth, carefully map- 

 ping the islands and bends of the river. The wagons and land party 

 returned to the Missouri by travelling over nearly the route by which 

 they ascended. 



We enjoyed the greatest abundance of large game of all kinds 

 while on the Yellowstone river. 



On reaching Fort Union again we found our boat nearly ready, 



