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Washburn
Report Index
YELLOWSTONE EXPEDITION OF 1870
Page 20
ing sound. Beyond is a small bay, bounded by a
deposit of yellow clay, full of concretions, in curious forms of saucers,
stockings, pencils, and the like. The bottom of this bay is lined with a
whitish sediment which discolors the water along the shore. Hot sulphur
springs and lukewarm ponds were abundant. After traveling six miles we were
obliged to leave the beach and follow the pine ridges, in many places
through fallen timber, with some difficulty. We passed several large
alkaline soda springs and numerous swampy hollows between the ridges,
camping in a beautiful little valley near the shore of the lake. Distance 15
miles.
Barometer, 22.50; thermometer, 44°; elevation,
7,714 3/5 feet.
This point affords a fine view of the lake. A
strong wind from the west had been blowing all day, and the waves rolled in
to the height of four feet. The beach here is of volcanic gravel mixed with
calcareous shales, among which we found many beautiful specimens of colored
rock crystals and petrefactions. The climate and vegetable growths of the
Great Basin are strikingly different from those of the surrounding country.
The summer, though short, is quite warm, notwithstanding the elevation of
the district. Rains are frequent in the spring months, and the atmosphere is
comparatively moist. All the grasses grow rank, and are not of the seeded
varieties common to the country, being green and luxuriant, when the lower
valleys are parched by the sun. Ferns, huckleberries, thimbleberries, and
other products of a damp climate abound, all being of diminutive growth. It
is a miniature Oregon in vegetable productions, the pines being about the
height of those on the East Virginia shore, and other growths lessened in
proportion. Mosquitoes and gnats are said to be numerous in the early
summer, but we saw none at all. The snows of winter are very heavy, but the
cold is not sever for such an altitude. Doubtless the internal heat and
immense amount of hot vapor evolved, exert a powerful agency in moderating
the rigor of the climate. The basin would not be a desirable place for
winter residence. The only two men I have been able to find who ever
wintered there, both came out affected with goitres in the spring. It is a
disease very common among the Mountain crows, many of the old squaws having
enormous growth of the tumors, filling the whole space from the chin to the
breast.
Sixteenth day -- September 6. -- We broke
camp at 10:30, bearing eastward over the ridges for an hour, then turning
south into an open valley, through which runs quite a stream of yellow
sulphur-water, heading in the mountain range close by. On the slope of this
range, covering an area of three square miles, is the formation known as
Brimstone Basin. The whole lower range of the slope for that space is
covered with masses of either blue clay or yellow calcareous deposit,
perforated by millions of minute orifices, through which sulphur vapor
escapes, subliming in masses around the vents. These brimstone basins are
numerous, and many of them miles in extent. They are generally found on the
lower slopes of mountains, or at the foot of bluffs, but frequently occur in
level districts. The latter class are always wet, and generally impassable,
the crust of the earth being very thin, with a whitish mass of soft mud
beneath -- the most dangerous marsh imaginable. Several of our horses were
scalded by breaking through in passing over such places.
From this valley our route was greatly obstructed
by fallen timber, obliging us to follow the lake shore whenever practicable,
and this was often miry, being a bed of soft clay, covered with coarse lava
pebbles, growing larger in size as we advanced. In the afternoon we reached
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Page 21
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