troops advancing in line. Whole prairie dotted with buffalo as far as eye can reach. Every dry swamp & hole containing water poached up by them & well worn paths in every direction. Poor feed for horses as the buffalo have cropped all the good grass off so short. Several calves killed today & some old animals. One small drove driven past parallel to waggons & stood a regular fusilade from all hands without much apparent damage.

Country passed over dry & parched compared with that round the Buttes, but covered a pretty close growth of short-grass, Stipa & [a small drawing of two blue grama heads] (see Specimens). Cactus begins to appear more common eastward. Have not seen any since leaving Rocky Mts to this place.

The soil is rather light coloured & does not seem to contain much vegetable matter. It is often quite gravelly & very hard. Altogether of little consequence agriculturally, though the grass is sweet & nutritious & would afford good grazing, as everywhere in this country.

Geol. Reexamined various sections by the road. A few miles N & E of the Trap Dyke (previously mentioned) found a rich shell bed (see specimens) overlying a considerable thickness of soft sandstones and arrenacious clays.

In another coulée. Irregular layers of large partly connected, roughly lenticular masses of ironstone developed, overlying pale grey-green sandy clay& overlain by sandstone, yellowish & brownish, & yellowish sandy clay.