124 LECTURES. 



What reason could be given for admitting the old and rude sketches 

 of coast lines, river courses^ and mountains, made from the time of 

 Columbus, and which form only a very small part of what constitutes 

 the body of a continent, and excluding all the equally useful and 

 necessary pictures of the distribution of its animal, vegetable, and 

 mineral contents ? Why should we be satisfied with the mere outlines 

 of the political boundaries of states, provinces, counties, and cities, 

 when the Indian tribes, European races, languages, customs, manners, 

 crimes^ diseases, &c. , are equally subject to geographical distribution, 

 and can be delineated with the same precision and clearness? 



With Columbus commenced the hydrographical discovery and char- 

 tography of America. The geological discovery and chartography of 

 America began only a few years ago. Our first geological maps of 

 America of this century were as rude as the hydrographical maps of 

 the beginning of the sixteenth century. For some parts of the conti- 

 nent tliey have been greatly improved, for other parts they are still in 

 the first stage of development, and for many they do not exist at all. 

 These geological maps are now just as much scattered through all 

 sorts of books, offices, and depots, as were the hydrographical maps of 

 the olden time ; and unless we make complete collections of them now, 

 while it is possible, the rapid progress of science will cause them, in 

 like manner, to disappear. They are equally valuable, moreover, as 

 scientific documents ; they mark the point at which we have arrived, 

 they show what still remains to be done, and they serve as a solid basis 

 to build further upon hereafter. If we should collect and preserve the 

 one class, there is no reason why we should not likewise provide an 

 asylum for the other ; and why we should not, by an historically and 

 chronologically organised collection of all the attainable geological 

 maps of America, enable our successors to trace the progress of this 

 department of knowledge step by step ? 



And what is true as respects geological maps, holds good also with 

 regard to the botanical, zoological, magnetical, ethnographical, and 

 other numerous classes of maps. Each of them has had its beginning, 

 each has inaugurated a discovery of America in a new sense, and each 

 \& capable of progressive and indefinite improvement, 



I therefore do not hesitate to pronounce that we should collect and 

 register every map of every description on which a successful attempt 

 has been made to depict any feature of the country that is subject to 

 geographical influences, and is capable of being more accurately con- 

 veyed to the mind by means of colors and lines than by mere verbal 

 description. 



IX. — ON THE CHOICE AND SELECTION OF THE MAPS. 



There can scarcely be a doubt that we should aim at completeness 

 in our collection of former American maps. This, it is evident, should 

 be a guiding principle, if our collection is to become essentially useful. 

 We should have of every part of the continent a connected series of 

 representations, which will explain each other, because they have 

 grown out of each other. 



