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In the present case there are seventy five sketches and drawings of great interest, and highly necessary to illustrate the report. It has not been possible to have these copied in time, but, in the printing of the report, the engraver will be allowed access to the originals, from which he would rather engrave than from copies, and which course will also save time. In the printing of the report, it is respectfully suggested that the printing of the map and sketches should be done under the superintendence of this office, from the belief that much time would be saved thereby.

Respectfully, sir, your obedient servant,

J. J. A BEBT,

Col. Corps Topographical Engineers.

Hon. G. W. CRAWFORD,

Secretary of War.

Journal of a military reconnaissance from Santa Fe, New Mexico, to the Navajo country, made with the troops under the command of Brevet Lieutenant Colonel John M. Washington, chief of the 9th, military department, and governor of New Mexico, in 1849, by James H. Simpson, A. M., First Lieutenant Corps of Topographical Engineers.

SANTA FE, N. M., April 11, 1850.

SIR:

I have the honor to submit, hereto subjoined, my journal and map of a reconnaissance of the country traversed by the troops under the command of Brevet Lieutenant Colonel John M. Washington, chief of the 9th military department, and governor of New Mexico, in an expedition against the Navajo Indians, in the months of August and September of the year 1849.

In addition to the journal will be found a number of appendices, viz: "A," my report to Colonel Washington of a reconnaissance of the borders of the Navajo country, with a view to the establishment of a post; '"B," a comparative vocabulary of the language of the Pueblo or civilized Indians of New Mexico, and of the wild tribes living upon its borders; "C," a letter from Assistant Surgeon John F. Flammond, of the army, giving a description of a room he saw among the ruins of Pueblo Bonito; "D," a schedule of minerals illustrative of the mineralogical and geological character of the country traversed; "E," a table of geographical positions and "F," a table of astronomical observations, with the results of calculation.

I also submit a number of sketches illustrative of the personal, natural, and artificial objects met with on the route, including portraits of distinguished chiefs, costume, scenery, singular geological formations, petrifactions, ruins, and fat similes of ancient inscriptions found engravers on the side walls of a rock of stupendous proportions, and of fair surface. For these truthful delineations, and the topographical sketches, I am indebted to my two assistants, Messrs. R. II. Kern and Al. Kern, brothers the former having furnished, with few exceptions, all the sketches of scenery, &c., and the latter the topography and other artistical work displayed upon the reap. To both these gentlemen I tender my grateful acknowledgments for the kind, zealous, and effective manner in which they ever were found ready to cooperate with me in the discharge of my