longitude of the place is 107 deg. 25' 23", latitude 42 deg. 29' 56".

2d.--Five miles above Rock Independence we came to a place called the
Devil's Gate, where the Sweet Water cuts through the point of a granite
ridge. The length of the passage is about three hundred yards, and the
width thirty-five yards. The walls of rock are vertical, and about four
hundred feet in height; and the stream in the gate is almost entirely
choked up by masses which have fallen from above. In the wall, on the
right bank, is a dike of trap-rock, cutting through a fine-grained gray
granite. Near the point of this ridge crop out some strata of the valley
formation, consisting of a grayish micaceous sandstone, and fine-grained
conglomerate, and marl. We encamped eight miles above the Devil's Gate.
There was no timber of any kind on the river, but good fires were made of
drift wood, aided by the _bois de vache_.

We had to-night no shelter from the rain, which commenced with squalls of
wind about sunset. The country here is exceedingly picturesque. On either
side of the valley, which is five miles broad, the mountains rise to the
height of twelve and fifteen hundred or two thousand feet. On the south
side, the range appears to be timbered, and to-night is luminous with
fires--probably the work of the Indians, who have just passed through the
valley. On the north, broken and granite masses rise abruptly from the
green sward of the river, terminating in a line of broken summits. Except
in the crevices of the rock, and here and there on a ledge or bench of the
mountain, where a few hardy pines have clustered together, these are
perfectly bare and destitute of vegetation.

Among these masses, where there are sometimes isolated hills and ridges,
green valleys open in upon the river, which sweeps the base of these
mountains for thirty-six miles. Everywhere its deep verdure and profusion