LETTER OF TRANSMITTAL I 



New York have advanced, the first nearly to completion. It is 

 planned to present as early as practicable a comprehensive re- 

 port on the stratigraphy and paleontology of the Portage forma- 

 tions. 



With this report is communicated, in addition to the papers 

 specified above, some observations by Prof. C. S. Prosser, of Union 

 university, on the succession of the formations in the Helderberg 

 mountain region. Though this is classical ground for the geolo- 

 gist, yet no carefully detailed and accurate sections available to 

 the general student have heretofore been published. 



On Aug. 7, 1898, occurred the death of James Hall M. D. LL. D., 

 the venerable head of this department, in his 87th year. Prof. 

 Hall had been in his usual health throughout the year, and so far 

 as was known had felt no foreboding of the coming end. He had 

 left Albany, as was his annual custom, to escape the summer heat, 

 and the end came to him at Echo hill, near Bethlehem (N. H.) It 

 is impossible in this place adequately to express the loss which 

 this department and the state of New York suffer by his death. 

 Prof. Hall had been in the service of the state since 1836, first hav- 

 ing been assistant to one of the original state geologists and since 

 1837 state geologist of New York, a period of public service ex- 

 tending over 62 years; a record probably unapproached in the 

 annals of the civil service of this state. With a more suitable 

 occasion a memorial of Prof. Hall's public career and service to 

 geologic science will be issued. 



Very respectfully 



John M. Clarke 

 Acting state geologist and paleontologist 



