128 Mr. Godon’s mineralogical observations. 
the great interest they have in the investigation of their soil. These 
local observations become éven worthy of general attention, when 
a consider, that from the insulated descriptions of several parts of 
the earth we may expect in time an universal mineralogical map, 
which will afford in some measure, under a single point of view, a rep- 
resentation of all the riches in the world. 
The observations, which I now present, are the sketch of a mine- 
ralogical description of the country, which surrounds Boston, to which 
a too short stay in that part of the United States prevented me from 
putting the finishing hand. I offer them to you in their state of im- 
perfection with the hope; that they will be completed by some of your 
fellow citizens, whose increasing taste for Oey presages to the 
people of Massachusetts a flourishing period for th 
The result of my observations, and the wish of communicating — 
them in the most brief and plain manner, have induced me to make _ 
a Slight alteration in the nomenclature of some rocks. I consider the — 
principal aggregate mineral, as a distinct genus, which should hayea _ 
single name, to which may be added a specific one, taken from the ac- — 
cidental occurrence of some element, or from some striking property. A 
This binary denomination, which prevents troublesome periphrasis, 2 
agrees with the basis of general nomenclature, pei in — 
history. 
These changes are limited to the rocks, described in the fllow | 
ing dissertation ; and I present them to those, who are dedicated t0 
mineralogical meditations, as an essay of a reformation, which obser 
vations, made in this vast continent, appear to render necessary in the 
nomenclature of the rocks, which compose the primordial soil, and 
even which form the whole series of the geognosical table. 
Si quid novisti rectius istis, 
Candidus imperti ; si non, his utere mecum. 
