2% REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1904. 



published in 1N18, a second edition of which appeared in 1820. In 

 these works he was anticipated only by Parker Cleaveland's Text-book 

 of Geology and Mineralogy, which appeared in 1816, though the volume 

 we arc now discussing was anticipated in 1826 by the work of Emmons. 



Eaton's general views regarding the formation of the various geolog- 

 ical deposits are summed up as follows: "The earth is composed of 

 masses of rocks and detritus which are more or less extensive and uni- 

 form in their characteristic constituents." "These masses are mostly 

 in regular deposits, and those of the same structure and composition 

 regard the same order of superposition in relation to each other. 1 '' A 

 few of the outermost masses, having no reference to each other, he 

 called "anomalous deposits." He divided these regular deposits into 

 live series, called classes, each of which "consists of three formations 

 which are found to be corresponding equivalents in all the series. 

 The lowest formation in each series is slaty or argillaceous and always 

 contains beds of carbon in the state of coal, anthracite, or plumbago." 

 The next is silicious and destitute of beds of carbon, and the upper- 

 most, also lacking in carbon, is composed chiefly of carbonate of lime. 



All the primitive formations he regarded as deposited in the form of 

 concentric spheres like the coats of an onion. These contained the 

 materials of which all outer formations were afterwards made up. 

 "Soon after these deposits were laid down they were broken up 

 through several northerly and southerly rents by a very great force 

 exerted immediately beneath the lowest of the primitive strata. In 

 this semi -indurated and broken state materials were readily furnished 

 for the outer strata." The source of the force producing these rents, 

 it will be remembered, was in his early works regarded as problematical 

 (p. 238). 



In this last work he, however, solved the problem in a manner best 

 understood by reference to the figures here reproduced, which he 

 claimed were an improvement on those given in the Index. 



The earth is here supposed to be cut into two parts at the forty- 

 second degree of north latitude. Large bodies of combustibles of an 

 undetermined nature, it will be observed, are conveniently stored 

 under what are now the regions of maximum disturbance, as the Rocky 

 Mountains. New England, Great Britain, the Alps, Pyrenees, Caucasus, 

 and the Himalayas. 



In the second figure combustion is supposed to have taken place, 

 whereby an explosion was produced which burst through the primitive 

 and transition series, and appalling indeed must have been the results. 



A geological segment, not reproduced here, gives in greater detail 

 a section across the American continent, showing the internal nucleus, 

 the areas of combustible matter under New York State and the Rocky 

 Mountains, and the alternation of the regular deposits, illustrating 

 his ideas as to the present condition of the earth. The combustible 



