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Show DEER CREEK- COAL BEDS- CROSSING OF NORTH FORE. 61 stretched across the river, and secured at the ends to either bank. Frail and insecure as was the appearance of this very primitive ferry- boat, yet all the wagons were passed over in the course of two hours, without the slightest accident, although many of them were very heavily laden. The animals were driven into the stream and obliged to ferry themselves over, which they did without loss, although the river was now somewhat swollen by late rains and the current extremely rapid and turbid. The ferrymen informed me that an emigrant had been drowned here, the day before, in essaying to swim his horse across, which he persisted in attempting, notwithstanding the earnest entreaties and warnings of his friends* They told us that this man made the twenty- eighth victim drowned in crossing the Platte this year; but I am inclined to believe that this must be an exaggeration. The charge for ferriage was two dollars for each wagon. The price, considering that the ferrymen had been for months- encamped here, in a little tent, exposed to the assaults of hordes of wandering savages, for the sole purpose of affording this accommodation to travellers, was by no means extravagant. A short distance above where the road crosses Deer Creek, coal was found cropping out of the bluff on the left bank of the stream. Ascending the creek, the direction of which was about north by west, the strata were inclined at an angle of about three degrees, but not at right angles to the dip, which appeared to be north by east. The coal was lying on a stratum of white sandstone of considerable thickness; above it were some dark shales; and above these, gray sandstones, in which latter were found fossils of Sigil-laria, and, in those under the coal, stems of Catamites ; but as the only examples that could be obtained were from rocks which had been exposed to the action of the weather, they were imperfect. The stratum of coal was three or four feet thick, and resembled the cannel coal very much; but as the only specimens obtained were very much weathered, this could not be ascertained with certainty. As the strata rose, the coal could be traced ascending the hills on the side of the bank, and the deeper underlying rocks became more fully exposed. They consisted of sandstones, varying in colour from red to gray, and containing many fossils, principally vegetable. The road, after crossing the river, runs mostly on the side of the bluffs, which here approach much nearer than on the south side. They consist of reddish sandstone, containing some curious |