First Expedition to Kansas Chalk 47 



would not leave, however, without my load of fos- 

 sils, as I feared that during my absence my rivals 

 would come upon this Eldorado and clean it out. So 

 the cook was told to parch a kettleful of corn, and 

 we made our meals on that. In fact, we filled our 

 pockets with it and lived on it for three days, eat- 

 ing most of the time to keep ourselves sufficiently 

 nourished. 



We had always depended for fuel upon the buf- 

 falo chips which even then were strewn about every- 

 where, but fortunately we found here an old dead 

 cottonwood tree, a rare thing in that region, where 

 even the willows on the river banks are short and 

 stunted. But for this wood we should have suffered. 



We remained there until we had loaded our 

 wagon with eight hundred pounds of fossil verte- 

 brates. 



During the summer my constant use of a large 

 butcher knife in cutting away the chalk from speci- 

 mens caused a felon to form in the palm of my hand. 

 A fistula resulted, and for ten days- 1 slept but little, 

 and could not work in the field. 



Finally, worn out by hard labor and constant at- 

 tacks of ague, I felt that my strength was failing, 

 and called on Professor Cope for an assistant. He 

 sent me J. C. Isaac, from Illges Ranch, Wyoming; 

 but matters were not much improved, for Mr. Isaac 

 had but a short time before seen five of his compan- 



