Reports of explorations and surveys, to ascertain the most practicable and economical route for a railroad from the Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean
A United States War Department survey volume published in Washington in 1855, issued to report on explorations for a Pacific railroad route from the Mississippi to the Pacific. The four plates shown are botanical drawings of plant sprigs and dissected flower parts, plus a panoramic lithograph of mountain terrain; a designer could take their fine pencil-like linework, precise scientific labelling and layered spreads of detail as a model for technical illustration.
