SKETCH OF EBENEZER EMMONS. 407 



pinned on when he was a small boy. His mother often used to 

 say: "Eb, why do you always have your pockets filled with 

 stones ? I have to mend them every week." His birthplace and 

 the adjoining town of Chester were noted for rare minerals. When 

 he came home for a vacation from school or college he generally 

 brought some fellow-student with him. He and his friend would 

 set off for the mineral localities and be gone all day, coming back 

 tired and hungry, but were always ready to go again the next 

 morning. 



He was fitted for college under the instruction of the Rev. 

 Moses Halleck, of Plainfield, Mass., a well-known educator of his 

 time, and was graduated from Williams College in due course. 

 Prof. Marcou gives 1820 as the year of his graduation, but the 

 General Catalogue has him in the class of 1818, which seems to be 

 conclusive. As a college student his interest in the sciences was 

 quickened by the instruction of Prof. Amos Eaton and Prof. 

 Chester Dewey, and he subsequently had a large share in intro- 

 ducing the study of these subjects among the young men of the 

 country. After completing his college course Mr. Emmons con- 

 tinued his favorite studies at the Rensselaer School, graduating 

 there with the class of 1826. In the same year he published his 

 Manual of Mineralogy and Geology for the use of the students 

 of that institution. He also studied medicine at the Berkshire 

 Medical School, and established himself as a practicing physician 

 in Chester, Mass. 



In 1818, at the age of nineteen, Mr. Emmons married Miss 

 Maria Cone, of Williamstown, and at the age of thirty-seven be- 

 came a grandfather by the birth of a son to his eldest daughter. 



In 1828 Dr. Emmons removed to Williamstown, where he con- 

 tinued to practice medicine, and in the same year was appointed 

 lecturer on chemistry in Williams College. A cabinet of minera- 

 logical and geological specimens which he began to collect here 

 was presented by him to the college after it had received the valu- 

 able accretions of twenty years. He resided in Williamstown 

 until 1838, becoming the most eminent practitioner in Berkshire 

 County. In 1830 he was appointed junior professor in the Rens- 

 selaer School and held the position till 1839. He was also a lec- 

 turer in the Medical School of Castleton in the days of its re- 

 nown. His chair in Williams College was enlarged in 1833 * to a 

 professorship of Natural History, which he held till 1859, when 

 the department was divided, he retaining the mineralogy and 

 geology till his death. 



Having been appointed upon the Geological Survey of New 



* The History of Williams College, another book by the Rev. Calvin Durfee, D. D., 

 above quoted, gives 1848 as the year of his election to the professorship of Natural History. 



