352 PIONEERS OF SCIENCE IN AMERICA. 



drawn from nature, and in some of the orders, as in Coleoptera 

 and Hemiptera, have a degree of excellence which is rarely sur- 

 passed even at the present day. ; 



About the time the third volume came from the press he 

 was appointed State geologist of North Carolina. In his new 

 field he made further important contributions to the advance 

 of American geology. In the coal measures of the Deep and 

 Dan rivers he discovered a grand Triassic flora, and a fauna 

 that included among many ancient vertebrates the Droma- 

 therium sylvestre, the oldest mammal yet found anywhere in 

 the world. His description of the new red sandstone flora of 

 North Carolina proved so valuable that twenty years after his 

 death the United States Geological Survey reproduced all the 

 plates and descriptions given by him in the sixth part of his 

 American Geology. Three volumes of North Carolina reports 

 were published by him. One on the Geology of the Midland 

 Counties was issued in 1856; a volume devoted to the Agri- 

 culture of the Eastern Counties, with descriptions of the fossils 

 of the marl beds, in 1858; and a second part of his report on 

 the agriculture of the State, " containing a statement of the 

 principles of the science upon which the practices of agricul- 

 ture as an art are founded," appeared in 1860. The Civil War 

 interrupted his labours. The anxieties and separation from 

 friends occasioned by it probably hastened his death, which 

 took place at his residence in Brunswick County, N. C, 

 October i, 1863. His wife, a son, and two daughters, sur- 

 vived him. 



Besides the works already mentioned, Prof. Emmons pub- 

 lished an account of the Taconic System (Albany, 1844). Hav- 

 ing been commissioned by Governor Edward Everett to report 

 upon the Zoology of Massachusetts, he prepared a volume, 

 devoted to the quadrupeds, which was printed at Cambridge 

 in 1840. His American Geology, which appeared in 1855, was 

 supplemented by a Manual of Geology in 1859. 



A clear-sighted and energetic worker, Dr. Emmons was a 

 living force for the advancement of his chosen science. The 

 Rev. Mark Hopkins, President of Williams College from 1836 

 to 1872, said of him: "Emmons was a man of remarkable 

 power and great accuracy of observation. He seemed to have 

 an intuitive perception of the differences in natural objects. 

 He possessed an intense enthusiasm in his work, but in his 



