KI^SUMi, AND GENEllAL DISCUSSION". 



553 



no one will deny ; and for the purpose of throwing light on the origin 

 of the methods in question we naturally sock to ascertain what were tlio 

 principles by whicli that survey was governed. No one conversant with 

 the history of that organization will doubt tliat its methods and pur- 

 poses were arranged and formulated by the geologist wlio was its head 

 during the first twenty-seven years of its prosecution : that none of his 

 subordinates did originate them, may readily be inferred from the fact 

 that the second in authority had been trained as a midshipman, having 

 previous to his joining the survey had no other experience than that 

 gaiued on the Ordnance Survey of Great Britain, while he remained 

 essentially an explorer and a stratigraphical geologist in all his methods. 

 That the one who for so many years served as the mouthpiece of the 

 Canada Survey did not prescribe its methods, can be readily inferred 

 from his own statement,* that, for " oftlcial reasons," he did not dissent 

 from Logan's views, the correctness of which ho for many years doubted j 

 and from the fact that at the very time when he says he did not believe 

 in these opinions he was warmly supporting them in print. This is 

 further enforced by the fact, that, almost as soon as Logan resigned, 

 Hunt began to endeavor to overturn the work of the survey and the 

 teachings of his previous years. Li fact, he has quite recently started 



on a third erusade, with principles designed to upset all he has written 

 before, t 



The only other officials who, before the closing years of Logan's work, 

 bore any prominent part in the study of the older crystallines were a 

 young civil engineei-, and two persons whose knowledge of geology had 

 been chiefly acquired by practical cultivation of the soil. 



Logan alone then seems to have been the motive power of the survey; 

 and it now is necessary to ascertain in what way and nnder what influ- 

 ences he was prepared for his geological work. 



From ILxiTington's Life of Logan we learn that the latter was em- 

 ployed in the eounting-liousc of his uncle, in mercantile pursuits, from 

 1817 uutd about 1831, when he went to Wales as tlie business manaa'er 



of some copper-smelting works in which his uncle was interested. Later, 

 he added to this tlie business of coal mining. Since he requests his 

 brother to purchase and forward to him "some good work on mineral- 

 ogy and geology, Dr. Dickson will be able to tell you which are best," 

 we may infer that he not only knew nothing of the subjects of, or the 



* See ante, p. 458. 

 t Tlic Origin of Cryslnlliiie Uocks. 

 Society of Caiuulii, lUy 21, 1881. 



Abstract of a paper road Itofove the Koyal 



