56 FROM FORT LARAMIE TO FORT BRIDGER. 



Upon examining the bluff on the opposite side of the stream, the 

 strata were found to be composed of sandstone and clay with sand. 

 There was also a layer of sulphate of lime about four inches thick 

 and crystalline. In some of the layers of sandstone there were 

 ripple-marks of water ; others were thickly studded with oval bo- 

 dies about the size of pigeons' eggs. Other strata were formed 

 of more compact sandstone, not in layers but in irregular shaped 

 masses, as if composed of bones, much resembling what we had 

 remarked near Chimney Rock. Some fossils were collected, 

 but in not a very perfect state. In some of the sandstones there 

 were evidently a great many, but in the more friable they were 

 rotten; and in others the stone, in the endeavour to get them out, 

 split in every direction. A crystalline mass of what was thought 

 to be sulphate of lime was also found, with dark crystals inter- 

 spersed. The top of the hill was covered with masses of primitive 

 rock, probably from the decomposition of conglomerate. The 

 hunters brought in the choice parts of three fat buffalo-cows to- 

 day, which fairly loaded down their pack-mules. The meat was 

 estimated to weigh upward of one thousand pounds. 



Saturday, July 21. — We followed up the dry bed of a fork of 

 Bitter Creek for three or four miles, when it crosses over a high 

 ridge and descends precipitously into a narrow ravine forming the 

 heads of a branch of Horse-shoe Creek. Following down this 

 ravine, which gradually widens into a broad valley, walled in by 

 steep bluffs, much cut by ravines and entirely destitute of timber, 

 we reached Horse-shoe Creek, a beautiful stream of running water, 

 clear, soft, and very cool. There are two tracks here, one crossing 

 below the junction of the two forks, two hundred yards to the 

 right, the other crossing both forks. The latter was taken, and 

 after crossing the western forks, we followed up its valley for a 

 couple of miles, over some very high, rolling country, and 

 crossing over to the valleys of two dry sandy beds, came to a 

 branch seven miles from Horse-shoe Creek, upon the left bank of 

 which we encamped. 



All the dry beds we have passed to-day give evidence of dis- 

 charging large quantities of water, which, at the melting of the 

 snows, descend from the Black Hills, a range immediately on our 

 left. Their channels are full of rolled primary rock, feldspar, and 

 white and pink quartz, brought down by the spring torrents. 

 Upon the top of the dividing ridge between Bitter Creek and 



