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epoch of the nondescript skeleton. Did it inhabit 

 the sea or the land ? Was it carnivorous or herbivo- 

 rous ? It calls upon the botanist, in return for the 

 trees and plants which it discovers and brings to the 

 surface, to say \vhat soil gave them root and nourish- 

 ment, and in what climate they existed. It fills the 

 cabinet of the conchologist with disentombed trea- 

 sures, the models of extinct reigns, and calls upon 

 him to give them date and sequence. Indeed, it can 

 scarcely be described as one science, so numerous 

 are the problems presented by it which demand the 

 most minute knowledge of the tributary branches of 

 conchology, zoology, botany, hydrography, minera- 

 logy, and general physics. 



Among the numerous sciences which geology puts 

 under contribution, none bear a more intimate re- 

 lation to it than Mineralogy. Geology deals with 

 masses; but it is by the aid of mineralogy that 

 the simple elements of these masses are unfolded, 

 and their various constitutions identified. Geology 

 teaches us that a certain mountain ridge is composed 

 of granite ; mineralogy informs us that granite is a 

 compound of quartz, feldspar, and mica. When 

 the geologist describes the strata forming the solid 

 crust of the earth, the dykes by which they are frac- 

 tured, and the mineral veins dispersed among them, 

 he uses terms devised by the mineralogist to indicate 

 their differences of character and condition. Geolo- 

 gy extends its vision over almost illimitable space ; 

 mineralogy examines every substance with a micro- 

 scopic eye. Geology tends to extensive generaliza- 

 tion ; mineralogy to minute specification. What the 



