The surveyors arrived a few days after we had established camp. A Mr. Prout was in charge of the party and they stayed at camp several days to establish the exact latitude and longitude of the camp as a base from which to make additional surveys. I became very much interested in this work and they explained a good deal of it to me but I was surprised at the time it required and the figuring necessary. I had the pleasure of watching the chronometer and calling time on signal from the observer. The nights were clear and in that rare atmosphere the stars shone with great brilliancy. An escort accompanied the surveyors in their work, a squad of a half dozen men in command of a noncommissioned officer, generally a sergeant, and each week these were relieved by others and returned to camp. There was practically no need for a surgeon with the camp that summer, the only two cases in the hospital being a man who was blinded by a premature shot in the mines and my pointer dog which I shot on one of my hunting trips. The country along the Rio Grande was unsettled, there being but one abandoned log-house between Fort Garland and Loma, now called Del Norte, a Mexican village with a good sprinkling of American houses, and located at the head of what was called the San Luis valley. The log-house was dignified by the name of Alamoosa and was our camp-ground and half-way place between Fort Garland and our summer camp. The trip was generally made in two days although the distance was nearly one hundred miles. From Loma to the camp, a distance of some fifteen miles, the mountains sloped gradually to the river and there were a few adobe houses occupied by Mexicans. As there was very little to do I spent a good deal of time hunting and fishing. Rainbow trout are very plentiful in the river for here it was a clear rushing mountain stream with deep pools and the water was cold throughout the summer from melting snows. We had fish at all times and cooked in every imaginable way until we were almost sickened at the thought of fish, although they were always pretty to look at. To this day my wife does not want to see or eat fish. All kinds of game were abundant but I never had much success with the larger varieties, I did not understand deer hunting and always managed it the wrong way. I did not know anything about their runways, so still hunting was not practical and in riding over the mountains they saw me before I saw them and that settled the matter. I tried repeatedly to get a shot at an elk that I frequently saw on his favorite grazing ground, a small park a half mile or more away near the top of one of the high points in the mountains, but with all my care, and calculating the direction of the wind, and figuring on the best way of approach, he would always scent the danger while I was making my way through the thicket of aspens that surrounded the park and I could hear the keen whistle-like note and hear him bounding away before I caught sight of him.