Page:The Journal of geology (IA journalofgeology21894univers).pdf/222

number of similar short, descriptive reports appeared in these volumes.^[1]

Between the years 1804 and 1807 the Lewis and Clarke^[2] and the Pike^[3] expeditions were conducted for the United States government. These expeditions added much to our knowledge of the geography^[4] of the country traversed, but their geological results were meagre, and limited to a strip of country adjacent to the lines of travel.

The year 1815 is worthy of note as marking the beginning of the Land Office surveys in the state. These surveys continued until 1850, and supplied and admirable basis for future areal work in geology. Of interest in this connection is the fact that, during the first two or three decades of operations, the surveyors were required to report to the Land Office, along with their other field notes, the presence or absence of mineral on the land traversed. Drusy quartz, known as "mineral blossom," and other superficial phenomena of wide occurrence, were used as criteria, and, as these notes formed the basis for local classification, complaints soon became loud that so much land was being withdrawn from occupation on account of its being classed as "mineral land," that the settling of the country was seriously interfered with. This led eventually to the abandoning of the early, crude attempt at accomplishing some of the objects of a geological survey.

Schoolcraft's well known tours throughout the western country were made between the years 1816 and 1819, and the three volumes^[5] of his observations contain much excellent statistical