On the sixteenth of July General Robert Patterson of Philadelphia with his sister and daughter arrived on the steamboat "Warrior". For their amusement the Indians staged the "dog-dance", using for their victims two dogs which were presented to them by the officers of the garrison. Accompanied by a soldier George Catlin left for Prairie du Chien on July 27th. "About this lovely spot", he wrote, "I have whiled away a few months with great pleasure, and having visited all the curiosities, and all the different villages of Indians in the vicinity, I close my notebook and start in a few days for Prairie du Chien, which is three hundred miles below this; where I shall have new subjects for my brush and new themes for my pen, when I may continue my epistles."[455] In the thirties began that series of geological surveys which has continued ever since, under both the national and State governments. In the fall of 1835 George William Featherstonhaugh and William Williams Mather, geologists in the service of the government, made a survey of the Minnesota Valley. The detailed scientific report of the survey was published by the government;[456] while a popular description of the trip, written by Mr. Featherstonhaugh, appeared in London in 1847 entitled, "A Canoe Voyage up the Minnay Sotor". From September 12th to September 15th on the up-journey and from October 16th to October 22nd on the return, the scientist was entertained at the fort. The reception which he received did not impress him with its cordiality. "I could not but reflect upon the contrast betwixt the very kind attentions I had received at the other American posts, and the want of them I experienced here."[457] But the feeling was mutual. The keen Indian agent characterized him by saying: "He attempted to pass current for that which he possessed not--superior talent and modesty in his profession."[458] Mr. Featherstonhaugh was an Englishman in whose narrative American institutions were not praised. Even the presence of his American co-laborer, Mr. Mather, is not suspected by reading the entertaining story, for his name is not mentioned once. It is difficult, therefore, to judge how accurate the account of his stay at Fort Snelling really is. The room which was given to him for his use was "an old dirty, ill-smelling, comfortless store-room", and Major L---- (Loomis?) who was asked by the commandant to provide accommodations for the visitor bored him with his psalm-singing and exhortations, being "a living rod in soak to tickle up sluggish Christians". But, probably unwittingly, Featherstonhaugh admitted that Fort Snelling was of some service to him. For the supplies and vegetables taken from the post gardens brought the gunwale of the canoe to within four inches of the water![459]