MEMORIAL OP C. W. HAYES 113 



usual diffidence, he took no public part in the movement. Nevertheless, 

 in the application of the principle that the mineral resources should be 

 put to their best use both for this and for future generations he rendered 

 very important service. Hayes had small patience with the extremists 

 of either side when the matter became a national issue, but analyzed the 

 problem on a scientific basis. Chamberlain once said of Hayes that one 

 of his most important contributions to the cause was the "conservation 

 of common sense.^' Hayes's own special task was the supervision of a 

 report on the mineral reserves of the United States, which was demanded 

 as the basis of wise legislation and administration. To this he contrib- 

 uted a chapter on the iron ore resources. It was during his administra- 

 tion of the geologic branch that the important work of classifying the 

 public lands was undertaken by the National Survey. In this field his 

 genius for organization and wise counsel were of the greatest value. 



Some have held that Hayes as Chief Geologist led the National Survey 

 from pure to applied science. That the modern trend of geologic re- 

 search has been toward the making of the science more useful can not be 

 denied; but it is equally true that this is only a part of a world-wide 

 movement demanding that science be applied to the betterment of the 

 conditions of life. Hayes was not responsible for this trend, though in 

 full sympathy with it. He believed the people had a right to expect that 

 the geologist, especially he who was supported by the public purse, should 

 give help in solving the problems of every-day life. He knew full well, 

 however, that the problems of applied geology can only be solved by in- 

 vestigating those giving no promise of yielding immediate economic re- 

 turn. The published record of his stewardship of the geology of the 

 National Survey clearly shows that the needs of pure science were not 

 neglected. The work in applied geology directed and done by him was 

 in no sense a commercialization of the science, but rather placing it on 

 tlie broad basis of scientific research. Hayes had no patience with short- 

 cats in geology. Economic work that could not stand the acid test of 

 science he rejected without question. 



As shown above, his training and inherent traits gave him a certain 

 lack of sympathy with speculations which were not very closely tied to 

 the facts. He appeared more interested in acquiring the detailed facts 

 than in establishing the broader relations between those facts. This was 

 not true of his physiographic studies, where he showed that he had that 

 quality of scientific imagination generally regarded as essential to the 

 solving of the larger problems of the science. In stratigraphic and struc- 

 tural geology, however, he believed that the larger problems could only 

 be solved by detailed surveys, in the work of which he himself showed a 



