xU PREFACE. 



•cknowledgments have been duly expressed, not only to amateur collectors of 

 fossils, but also to professors in colleges and scientific gentlemen generally, both 

 within the State and beyond its borders, for their willing aid in the progress of 

 the work. Without such aid some portions could not have been properly illus- 

 trated (aa I waa compelled to depend solely on my own purse for collections 

 made in the field during the preparation of the earlier volumes). These volumes 

 (I, II, III), therefore, present a less complete illustration of the faunas of the 

 geological formations to which they refer, than do the later volumes, which were 

 published after the State had furnished means for making field collections. 



Volumes I and II should be revised and republished with all the added 

 knowledge of these faunas obtained during the past third of a century. 



This work, from its commencement in 1843, has been prosecuted amid many 

 difficulties, and often under conditions which would have justified its final 

 abandonment. These hindrances have been overcome, and a series of volumes 

 has been published, and accepted as a contribution to the scientific literature 

 of the world. 



The work in the agricultural and palaeontological departments was carried 

 on in the old State Hall (State Cabinet of Natural History) on State street, 

 until 1845, when the authors were compelled to remove themselves and their 

 work from the building. This requirement proved seriously burdensome to the 

 Palaeontologist, necessitating at once the erection of a building of moderate size 

 with ordinary working rooms ; and afterwards (when the Legislature began to 

 make appropriations for collections of fossils), two extensive buildings were 

 found necessary ; these were erected at my own cost and fitted up with about 

 four thousand drawers, for the proper disposition of the immense collections 

 brought in from the field, together with rooms and conveniences for the prepara- 

 tion, study and arrangement of fossils, and offices for draughtsman and 

 lithographer ; and they were occupied as a museum and laboratory till the end 

 of 1886. Prior to 1871 the Legislature made no provision for the expenses of 

 these or any other working rooms, nor for clerk hire and incidental outlay. 



From 1850 onward for several years no appropriations were made for carry- 

 ing on the work, and even the author's small salary was discontinued. From 



