70 GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF WISCONSIN. 



with the upper Mississippi lead region. The "Wisconsin legislature 

 passed an act, approved by Gov. Randall, April 2, 1860, author- 

 izing the governor to use that portion of the fund accruing under the 

 law of 1857, from the signing of the act until the organization of the 

 survey in 1858, to the payment of Prof. Whitney and Col. Whittlesey, 

 and also making Prof. Hall principal of the geological commission. 

 Col. Whittlesey explored the country, and commenced a report on the 

 iron region of Lake Superior. Prof. Whitney completed his surveys, 

 maps and reports of the lead region. An act was passed, approved 

 April 35, 1861, authorizing and directing the governor of the state 

 " to purchase of Prof. James Hall one thousand copies of the first vol- 

 ume of his Geological Report of Wisconsin, confined mainly to the 

 lead region, with the details of the geology, mineralogy, and mining 

 thereof; and to contain between four and five hundred pages. The 

 said volume shall embrace a chapter on the general geology of the 

 state, and its relation to the surrounding states, and shall be the same 

 size, and in all respects as to type, paper and binding, equal to the 

 Iowa Geological Report, with all inecessary maps and illustrations; 

 provided, that the said one thousand copies, delivered at the capitol in 

 the city of Madison, shall not cost more than three dollars each." In 

 1862, the said first volume of Prof. Hall's report was published in 

 accordance with the specifications of the law. Prof. Whitney's re- 

 port of the lead region occupies three-fourths of the volume. Both 

 Hall and Whitney are masters in this field of science, and the work 

 of both was well done. 



The next year the legislature, under the pressure and excitement of 

 the war, repealed the law authorizing the geological survey of the 

 state. Whereupon, Dr. Carr and Mr. Daniels abandoned the field. 

 Not so Prof. Hall. He had a contract, under seal, with the governor, 

 according to the provisions of the law, and claimed that the legisla- 

 ture could not annul it. He continued his labor, and completed that 

 portion of his work which had been assigned to him in its division 

 among the three commissioners. The second volume of his report 

 has been ready for publication more than a dozen years. Prof. Hall 

 has made repeated applications to the legislature of Wisconsin for 

 compensation, but in vain. We are informed that he has brought 

 suit against the state, through ex-Chief Justice Dixon, for two thou- 

 sand dollars (a year's salary, under his contract), with accrued inter- 

 est amounting to as much more. The second volume of his report, 

 in manuscript, has in the intervening time been a loss to science and 

 a loss to the economic geology of Wisconsin. It contains, we are in- 



