[hay] the scientific WORK OF PROF. H ARTT 1 61 



with the support of government. Ilartt entered upon the work in 

 June, 1875, with a corps of assistants that at no time exceeded sis. His 

 phm was to make a preliminary survey of the country before entering 

 much into details, but he succeeded in thoroughly investigating s,ome 

 of the regions he explored.^ As time went on and none of those imme- 

 diate results were evident, such as the development of great mineral 

 wealth which the leading men in the country expected would follow, 

 disappointment manifested itself. The annoyances arising from the 

 lack of necessary funds, the jealousies of local scientists, who could not 

 enter into his spirit or his methods, met him at every step. But he 

 would not swerve from his purpose. " As is the duty of every scientific 

 man," he says, " I have carried on my investigations in a purely scien- 

 tific way, hoping that later on they would not fail to be of practical 

 importance. . . . All this preliminary work (alluding to his know- 

 ledge of the country, the preparation of his assistants for their work, 

 the aid and advice of eminent scientific specialists eveijwhere), so 

 exceedingly important to the geological commission, has cost nothing 

 to government. . . . My great desire has been to lay a firm founda- 

 tion for Brazilian geology in the development of palseontological locali- 

 ties and the accurate determination of characteristic formations by means 

 of fossils, and to this end the commission has laboured with a degree 

 of success surprising to myself, and we find ourselves to-day with an 

 embarras de richesses. The commission as at present constituted com- 

 prises only six persons, on whom has fallen all this work of collecting, 

 arranging and studying this material, which in richness is to be com- 

 pared with that of the ^ Thayer ' or 'Hassler ' or * Challenger ' expedi- 

 tions ; and it is not reasonable to expect that without free access to 

 scientific libraries and collections for comparison, the work of the 

 Brazilian Commis;sion should go on more rapidly than that of the foreign 

 commissions where the material is divided up among dozens of special- 

 ists and where the scientific man enjoys every advantage." 



In the latter part of the year 1877 the work of the Commission was 

 temporarily sus^pended from motives of economy, and before measures 

 could be taken for its resumption in the following year, Hartt had died 

 at Eio Janeiro from yellow fever, or, as the attendant physician pro- 

 nounced, of congestion of the brain, induced by worry and exhaustion. 

 The perplexities rather than the actual work of the commission had 

 worn him out ; and though his friends who had long noted with anxiety 

 his condition pleaded with him to return home, he had refused, alleging 

 that he was in honour bound to stand by the Commission. 



' Richard Kathbun : Life and Scientific Work of Prof. Chas. Fred. Hartt, April, 

 1878. 



