CHAPTER IV. 



THE ERA OF STATE SURVEYS, SECOND DECADE, 1840-1849. 



The fever for State surveys, so prevalent during- the last decade, 

 would seem to have very quickly subsided, since during- the period 

 now under consideration such were established only in Alabama, 

 South Carolina, and Vermont. Governmental surveys were also few, 

 being limited to those by P. D. Owen in the Chippewa land district, 

 and Jackson, Foster, and Whitney in the Lake Superior region. 



The cause of this sudden cessation is not quite apparent. Nine of 

 the twenty-six States forming the Union at the beginning of the 

 decade had, so to speak, escaped the contagion, and onh' the three 

 above mentioned succumbed during the period, leaving Arkansas, 

 Georgia, Illinois, Kentucky. Louisiana, Mississippi, and Missouri 

 still unprovided for. It is possible, and perhaps probable, that the 

 period of great financial depression beginning in 1830 may have had 

 something to do with it, but as nine of the sixteen inaugurated dur- 

 ing the decade 1830-184:0 were established either during 1836 or the 

 three years immediately following, this is perhaps open to question. 

 An important factor may have been the lack of geologists to agitate the 

 subject and carry on the work, nearly every man of prominence and 

 experience being engaged in surveys and organizations already under 

 way. The period was. nevertheless, one of importance, one of mani- 

 fest results rather than of organization and preparation. 



The single event of greatest consequence during the decade was the 

 appearance of the four quarto volumes constituting the final reports 

 of Mather, Emmons, Hall, and Vanuxem of the New York survey, an 

 event which would, however, have been paralleled by the reports of 

 Rogers in Pennsylvania but for the dilatoriness of the State author- 

 ities. The volume of literature was naturally greater than at any., 

 previous period, since it included many of the reports of organizations 

 of the previous decade, as those of Percival in Connecticut (INI:'). 

 Booth in Delaware (1811), Jackson in New Hampshire (1811) and 

 Rhode Island (1810), and Rogers in New Jersey (1810). The estab- 

 lishment of a geological survey of Canada in 1811, the coming of 

 Lyell to America in the same year, the publication of his "Travels" 

 in 1844, and the coming of Agassiz in 1846 should also be mentioned. 

 The most noted of the participants in the events of the decade, as will 

 be seen, were H. D. Rogers, then in full vigor; Edward Hitchcock. 



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