8 GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF THE TEERITORIES. 



eftort was made by Colonel Eaynolds to cross the snow-covered sum- 

 mits of the Wind Eiver Mountains, but without success. In the summer 

 of 18G9, a small party, under Messrs. Cook and Folsom, ascended the 

 Valley of the Yellowstone, to the lake, and crossed over the divide 

 into the Geyser Basin of the Madison. 



In the summer of 1870, a second party, under General Washburn, 

 siu'veyor general of Montana, visited that country. Mr. X. P. Langford, 

 a member of the party, gave, in the May and June numbers, 1871, of 

 Scribner's Monthly, most glowing accounts of the marvelous wonders. 

 These articles called the attention of the whole country to that remarka- 

 ble region. Lieutenant G. C. Doane, Second Cavalry, United States 

 Army, accompanied the party in command of a small escort, and made 

 an official report of the trip to General Hancock, who forwarded it to 

 the honorable Secretary of War, General Belknap, who at once trans- 

 mitted it to Congress, with a request that it be printed. I desire to call 

 the attention of the i)ublic to the remarkable report of this young officer, 

 which he seems to have written under the insiiiration of the wonder- 

 ful physical phenomena around him. The report is a modest i^amphlet 

 of 40 pages, yet I venture to state as my opinion, that for graphic de- 

 scrij^tion and thrilling interest it has not been surpassed by any official 

 report made to our Government since the times of Lewis and Clarke. 



Colonel J. W. Barlow, United States Engineer Corps, on General 

 Sheridan's staff, and Captain D. P. Heap, United States Engineer Corj^s, 

 on General Hancock's staff, made an exploration of the Yellowstone 

 Basin during the past season, the results of which will doubtless soon 

 be given to the public in an officio! form. A very interesting and in- 

 structive abstract has already appeared in the Chicago Journal of 

 January 13. 



In attaching names to the many mountain-peaks, new streams, and 

 other geographical localities, the discover^' of which falls to the pleas- 

 ant lot of the explorer in the untrodden wilds of the West, I have fol- 

 lowed the rigid law of j)riority, and given the one bj' which they have 

 been generally known among the people of the country, whether whites 

 or Indians ; but if, as is often the case, no suitable descri^jtive name 

 can be secured from the surroundings, a personal one may then be 

 attached, and the names of eminent men who have identified them- 

 selves with the great cause, either in the fields of science or legislation, 

 naturally rise first in the mind. 



The wisdom of the policy of publishing for the people the immediate 

 results of my surveys, in the form of annual reports, eyen though some- 

 what crude, has received emphatic sanction by the gTeat demand for 

 them in past years and the general satisfaction they have given. I 

 have, therefore, made them the receptacle of a mass of observations on 

 the local geology of the routes which I cannot introduce into a more 

 elaborate final report. The attempt, also, to give to these annual reports 

 a somewhat popular as well as scientific cast has met with the cordial 



