190 Mountain Meteorological Stations and an 



My inspection was made unusually long for two reasons : first, be- 

 cause of the difficulties encountered in reaching the summit, and, 

 second, because of the very large amount of property which re- 

 quired examination for purposes of condemnation and destruction. 

 If I remember rightly, property had been accumulating for over seven 

 years, and it was scattered along the seventeen miles of road and trail, 

 from base to summit, in addition to large quantities at each station. 

 The property was of a motley description and comprised every article 

 known to the Signal Service, both animate and inanimate, from a pair 

 of tweezers to a mule and cart. The mules were of the regulation 

 army pattern. Some of the articles were buried under Bixty feet of 

 snow; others were resting quietly, but in a demoralized condition, 

 among the tree-tops along the trail, left there as the snow melted 

 away during the summer months; and others were found safely packed 

 away in a side-tracked freight car, near Manitou Springs, which car, 

 I found, had traveled all over the State of Colorado and parts of 

 Kansas and Wyoming, trying to find an owner for its burden of 

 telegraph material. 



The title of my paper appears to signify that my inspection was not 

 made in what we are accustomed to consider the winter season. That 

 is true. Not the winter of the lowlands, but the winter of the great 

 peaks of the Rocky ranges. The inspection began, as before stated, 

 in the second week of April, and continued throughout that week and 

 the one following. April is the greatest snow month of the year on 

 Pike's Peak. Besides having the greatest monthly precipitation of 

 snow, it finds upon the ground the accumulation of the six previous 

 months, which, on the average, amounts to about 100 inches. The 

 snowfall in April is on the average nearly twice as great as that of any 

 other month. In 1879 the fall reached the unprecedented amount of 

 131.5 inches of unmelted snow, the most excessive precipitation recorded 

 at the station during the entire period of its maintenance, over fifteen 

 years. Snow is precipitated in every month of the year ; rain only in 

 June, July, August and September; sleet in April to October, inclusive ; 

 and hail in March to September, inclusive. Rain fell once on March 

 3, 1874, sleet on November 20, 1885, and on March 25, 1874. In 

 August, 1874, the entire precipitation was snow, amounting to thirty- 

 seven inches, unmelted. In May, 1879 and 1880, and a June, 1879, 

 1880 and 1881, all was snow, sleet or hail, the average being sixteen 

 inches and the maximum thirty-three. The smallest precipitation 

 occurs in the months of September to March, inclusive, the lowest 

 monthly amounts ever recorded being .07 inch in November, 1883, 



