LIFE OF JAMES DWIGHT DANA 



with his life, that we found occasion for rejoicing amid our 

 tears." 



TO JULIUS H. WARD 

 Respecting James G. Percival, the Geologist of Connecticut 



" NEW HAVEN, November 6, 1865. 



" In compliance with my promise, I send you my 

 opinion of Percival as the Connecticut geologist. 



" In the expression Percival the geologist, few will 

 recognize a reference to Percival the poet; and yet, in 

 my opinion, no one in the country has done better work 

 in geology or work of greater value to the science. His 

 Geological Report on the State of Connecticut is certainly 

 the most unpoetical of works, it containing not even the 

 most obvious deductions from his observations. But 

 Percival had not finished his survey to his own satisfac- 

 tion (which perhaps he never would have done with such 

 views as he held of accuracy and perfection in research), 

 when he was called upon for his Report ; and, being un- 

 willing, in his sincerity to nature, to put forward so soon 

 any inferences of his own, he published only the bare 

 facts arranged in their driest geographical order. Yet in 

 this dry detail, and the admirable map accompanying the 

 volume, there is not only testimony to assiduous labor, 

 but an exhibition of results sufficient to teach philosophy 

 to the mind capable of appreciating them. The practical 

 or mineralogical part of the survey was in the hands of 

 Prof. C. U. Shepard, leaving to Percival the topographi- 

 cal and general geology. 



On entering upon his duties, Percival saw before him 

 two great problems : first, the character and origin of the 

 trap ridges of the State, such as East and West Rocks 

 near New Haven, the Hanging Hills of Meriden, and 

 other similar heights to the north and south, a most 

 striking feature throughout central Connecticut; and, 

 secondly, the characters and origin of the granitic series 

 of rocks which prevail through all the rest of the State. 

 Having lived from his youth among the trap hills, the 

 first of these departments of the Survey engaged his earli- 

 est and longest attention, and was most nearly completed. 



" It was the supposition of older geologists that West 



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