LIFE OF JAMES DWIGHT DANA 



a society that has good names in it, and which meets 

 once a month to talk science. Do you intend that other 

 societies should report to you on the subject, or direct to 

 the Library Committee, and had your report, or the same 

 in form, better be signed by a committee here, or another 

 form, alluding to your report ? Professor Silliman is 

 away now, but we will have his name on it. Your docu- 

 ment is a very excellent one. ... I am much pro- 

 voked that I must add a word of doubt as to whether the 

 coral volume can properly be reviewed in the next num- 

 ber of the North American, because the bills with regard 

 to it cannot be signed till Tappan comes from Ohio (which 

 they say will be in ten days). Wilkes thinks he sees in 

 the book a large amount of non-expedition matter, and 

 writes that his power does not extend so far as to allow 

 of his signing the bills. When this news first reached 

 me, I was vexed and had feelings as hard as a brickbat. 

 But I suppose Wilkes is right. Tappan saw the manu- 

 script, had it for three days in his hands, and finally gave 

 it his approval, remarking at the same time on the de- 

 scription of species not collected in the expedition, so 

 that I am safe, if there was any disposition to make 

 trouble. After the correspondence on the subject, I 

 should not wish to give the book for a review before it 

 has been presented to Congress. Perhaps you had better 

 prepare it, and if I hear about it in ten days or so I will 

 let you know. Hale's book is not under this encum- 

 brance, though actually as much liable to the objection 

 as mine, and the review of that can be published whether 

 mine joins it or not. My material, the result of the ex- 

 pedition observations, was sufficient for a reconstruction 

 of the science, and I have consequently made a complete 

 overhauling of the whole. In no other way could I have 

 brought out the results. The title-page has not yet 

 come; but I am still expecting it. 



' The plates are yet in the works, and not even half a 

 dozen are finished, and none of those are here. It will 

 probably be eight or ten months before they are all en- 

 graved. They will be hurried, as soon as we have our 

 next appropriation. They ought all to have been finished 

 before this. 



I will write you again the first news I get from 

 Washington. The next number of the Journal contains 



148 



