Hi PROCEEDINGS OF THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. [May 1904, 



of the esteem and affection with which her husband was 

 regarded. 



Lesley's theological views were slowly widening- — a change which 

 roused the anxiety of the rigidly-orthodox institutions with which 

 he was connected. The Tract Society in Philadelphia began to 

 move in the interests of the people of Boston, and ultimately his 

 licence to preach was withdrawn. A portion of his congregation, 

 however, adhered to him. and to them he continued to minister. 

 But as he gradually became more completely Unitarian, he finally 

 abandoned his pastorate in 1851. He was now thirty-two years 

 of age — a time of life at which most men find it too late entirely to 

 change their vocation. He, however, had never quite abandoned 

 geological work, and he could revert to it with all the more eager- 

 ness, as. while it offered him the prospect of better health and 

 sufficient maintenance, it opened out to him a career for which he 

 felt himself to be well qualified, in which he had already made his 

 mark, which promised him the most congenial occupation, and out 

 of which no theological wolves could scare him. The Pennsylvanian 

 Legislature in April 1851 at last made an appropriation for the 

 renewal of the Geological Survey, and Bogers immediately secured 

 Lesley as one of his chief assistants, his main object being to get 

 the maps reduced and published, together with the Beport. Owing 

 to various causes, the publication was delayed for some years. But 

 meanwhile Lesleys topographic power became generally known, 

 and brought him private employment. In 1853 and 1854 he was 

 engaged by the Pennsylvania Bailroad Company to construct a 

 large map, which was distinguished by the adoption of contour-lines 

 instead of hachures. He undertook other surveys or geological 

 reconnaissances, not only in Pennsylvania, but in South-Western 

 Virginia and South -Eastern Tennessee. 



In the midst of these avocations he found time, in the winter of 

 1855-56, to write his memorable little volume entitled ' Manual of 

 Coal & its Topography, illustrated by original drawings, chiefly 

 of facts in the Geology of the Appalachian region of the United 

 States of .North America, by J. P. Lesley, Topographical Geologist.' 

 1 well remember the pleasure with which, many long years ago, I 

 first perused this original and suggestive treatise. It could only have 

 been written by a man who, gifted with a keen eye and artistic 

 power, had been enabled to cultivate his observing faculties in a 

 region where the fundamental facts of geological structure were 

 displayed with altogether exceptional clearness. It dealt with 



