76 Review of the Results of the U. S. Coast Survey. 
An organized being, said Kant, is that of which all the parts _ 
are mutually ends and means. We are forcibly reminded of the | 
definition in studying the operations and results of the Coast — 
Survey. the results, in geography, in physics, in geology, 
in short in every branch of science, are at once means and ends: 
means, as they form necessary and integral parts of a great and 
symmetrical whole; ends, as they all possess a fixed and definite _ 
value in the sciences to which they belong. This remark, if true 
as applied to the Survey considered simply from a scientific point 
of view, is far more forcibly illustrated by the practical bearings 
of the work, every one of whose details ta an immediate prac- 
tical value, while the enduring, far-reaching utility of the whole 
is second to that of no other human undertaking. 
It is our purpose in the following pages to offer a concise view 
of the operations and results of the Coast Survey, regretting 
only that the necessary limits of a scientific review will scarcely 
permit us to give more than an outline sketch. s 
The survey of a coast so extensive as that of the United States 
is even in its general features a work of immense extent. That — 
coast stretches from New Brunswick to Mexico, and from the 
Straits of Fuea to Old California; upon the Atlantic and Gulf © 
Sac ts ase ci + % a 
5 No pene eS ates 3 Pt ae GD kaa Te Sea er dy 2 A aS A eee i 
must accurately locate every prominent point, map out the bot 
tom of every bay and harbor, fix the bearings of every reef and — 
shoal, trace the course of every current, deduce from long con- 
tinued observations the laws of the tides, and in short, observe — 
1d measure every peculiarity in the physical geography of the — 
coast which the most refined science, the most delicate methods _ 
of observation and the most perfect instrumental means can 
measure or detect. ce 
After a preliminary reconnoissance, the Survey begins with — 
measurement of a base, that is to say, with the accurate de 
termination of the length of a line upon the earth’s surface, the — 
two extremities of which shall serve as starting points. Setting | 
out from these two initial points, the survey proceeds by great | 
4 
Y 
steps of thirty or forty miles till the whole coast is covered with 
a network of large sig 2, constituting what is termed 4 
rimary triangulation. The angles only of these triangles 
measured, the sides being successively calculated by the ai 
the angles and base. The accurate measurement of this line lf 
volves the most delicate instrumental methods. The expansion 
