THE GEOLOGISTS TRAVELING HAND-BOOK. 



How lonely would be a journey on which you would see not a single face that 

 you know, and how different it would be if every one you meet were an old 

 friend. So to the tourist new charms must be given to scenery, however attractive 

 it may already be, if he knows something about its geology. The rocks, mountains, 

 valleys and plains, although he sees them for the first time, are old friends in 

 perhaps new and interesting forms. He meets them with a certain pleasure, for 

 he understands what he sees and he is given the materials for many a happy hour 

 of quiet and profitable reflection at home, on what he has seen on his railway 

 journey. 



2. FOR GEOLOGISTS. 



But while the book is thus intended primarily as a series of object lessons for 

 those to whom geology is yet a novelty, for the purpose of exciting an interest in, 

 and which may ripen into a love for the science, it is believed that, being in a more 

 convenient form than geological maps, and as no other work has attempted what 

 is here done, all geologists, and especially students, will find it a most useful hand 

 book on their railway journeys as well as for reference at home. It will be useful 

 in laying down the geology in colors on any map which gives the railroads. 

 Accurate geological maps can thus be made without expense, and there is no better 

 exercise for students. It will also be invaluable in selecting a route of travel for 

 geological study or for pleasure, and no geologist should make an excursion over 

 new ground without this guide. It is a scientific catalogue of the great panorama 

 that passes with its ever shifting scenery before the eyes of the American railway 

 traveler, and even an artist finds a catalogue of a picture gallery very necessary. 

 No geologist need be told that it embraces the result of a vast amount of learning, 

 labor and research in a very small compass, and a minuteness of local geology for 

 which he might ransack libraries in vain, and which no one man could possibly 

 furnish. Many men for many years have devoted the finest talents in America to 

 the study of the geology of these states, and all have contributed by their published 

 reports, or by direct original contributions to this work, portions of the knowledge 

 which is here indexed, otherwise it would not be becoming for the author to say 

 so much in its praise. In order that the guide might be as accurate as possible the 

 assistance of the state geologist of each state, or that of some scientific gentleman 

 best acquainted with its local geology, has been invoked to revise and correct the 

 list of formations found along the railroads. Without a single exception, and with 

 characteristic devotion to the cause of science, *' this aid has been very cheerfully 

 and promptly rendered, and in not a few instances, where the necessary information 

 was only in the knowledge of these gentlemen, they have filled in the geology from 

 original sources not yet published. Due credit is given to all contributors in the 

 notes of the proper chapter. The general accuracy of the book can be relied 

 upon as to the formations of each locality as they were understood at the time of 

 its publication, and it may be regarded as in harmony with the latest results of 

 geological research. If errors are found, consider the great number of railroad 

 stations and you will wonder there are so few. 



_ *Scientific men freely give the results of their labors to the world, expecting only in return to 

 enjoy the consciousness of having added by their investigations to the sura of human knowledge, 

 and to receive the credit to which they might justly entitle them. PROF. JOSEPH HENRY. 



