120 
as scientific correspondents. The account of this visit was 
given to the public in three volumes, duodecimo, in 1853. 
It was a work well stored with careful observations and in- 
teresting narratives, thus recalling many agreeable reminis- 
cences in the minds of those who have visited the same 
scenes, and communicating much useful information to those 
who have not. To show the public appreciation of this work, 
we may remark that, while new works of the same general 
description have been constantly teeming from the press, this 
has already passed through six editions. 
I have thus briefly referred to the published works of 
Professor Silliman. But these do not, by any means, com- 
prise the whole of his scientific labors. His special field 
was the diffusion of science; and his special gifts and 
acquirements made him one of the most popular scientific 
lecturers in the country. His commanding presence, his 
urbanity of address, his wealth of knowledge, his ready and 
graceful. elocution, were all fitted to win the public favor, 
and secure for him a large and delighted audience wherever 
it was his pleasure to speak. Without being profound or 
original, he selected from the great storehouse of knowledge, 
_ all familiar to him, so judiciously, and threw such an enchant- 
ment around his theme, that all felt a kindling of enthusiasm 
as they listened. They drank in the doctrines of latent heat 
and chemical equivalents, saw through all the forms and laws 
of crystallization, and could plainly read in minerals, and 
fossils, and rocks of the fields, the geologic eras which 
stretch back into the immeasurable past, where no human 
eye ever saw. It was the power of personal inspiration 
that seemed to quicken their intellects. 3 
Between the years 1834 and 1845, Professor Silliman 
she courses of scientific lectures in nearly all the large 
ses of the country, ranging fom Boston to New Orleans. 
