694 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



the course of this journey he visited all the ii'on-works where flasks 

 had been erected in England, Belgium, the south and west of France, 

 and in Austria. In the autumn of 1866 he sailed for Brest, by the 

 order of his physician, and, traveling through Italy, returned to per- 

 form his duties as United States Commissioner at the opening of the 

 Paris Exposition of 1867. After struggling with a painful illness 

 three months, he walked through the Vosges Mountains, and remained 

 the rest of the season at Vevay in Switzerland, and then went to 

 Egypt as the guest of Charles Hale, the United States consul-general 

 at that time, Avith whom he went up the river to the first cataract in 

 one of the viceroy's yachts, retvirning to Italy, England, and the 

 United States in the spring of 1868, but abstaining from all serious 

 business until the end of that year. 



His health slowly improved, but four years elapsed before he could 

 do an ordinary day's work ; and it has been his habit ever since to 

 seek relaxation from business, when too long continued, by short trips 

 to Europe. Such were made in 1872, 1874, 1876, 1878, 1880, 1882, 

 and 1884, in each case remaining abroad only two or three weeks. 



In 1872 Mr. Lesley was appointed Professor of Geology and Dean 

 of the Faculty to the newly established scientific department of the 

 University of Pennsylvania, and in 1874 he was made chief geologist 

 of Pennsylvania under a new act providing for a complete geological 

 resurvey of that State. He had, in 1842, constructed the State geo- 

 logical map and sections for Pennsylvania, and in 1846-'47 revised 

 them and prepared the drawings and a large part of the text of the 

 subsequently published report on the geology of that State. His work 

 as a geologist has been more especially devoted to the coal formations 

 of North America, and he is regarded as a chief authority on all ques- 

 tions connected therewith. His " Manual of Coal and its Topography " 

 (1856) is esteemed alike for its classification of the Appalachian coal 

 strata and for its illustrations of topographical geology. Most of Pro- 

 fessor Lesley's personal field-work remains unpublished, such as his 

 elaborate survey of the Cape Breton coal-fields in 1862-'63 ; his topo- 

 graphical and geological survey of the Broad Top coal-field, which 

 occupied two years ; his contoured map of the Kishkaminitas and 

 Loyalhanna country in Western Pennsylvania, ordered by the Pennsyl- 

 vania Railroad Company, which also occupied two years ; his survey 

 of the Tennessee coal-fields west of Knoxville, etc. 



Abstracts from his reports of surveys of the iron-ore deposits of 

 Huntingdon and Centre Counties, and of Cumberland and Franklin 

 Counties, Pennsylvania ; of the titaniferous iron-ore range of North 

 Carolina ; of the Embreeville district in East Tennessee ; of the ge- 

 ology of Tazewell, Russell, and Wise Counties in Virginia ; of coal, 

 iron, and petroleum districts in Western Pennsylvania ; and of the sur- 

 face petroleums of the Sandy River country in Kentucky — were pub- 

 lished, w^th maps and woodcuts, in the " Proceedings of the American 



