PREFACE 



It has been the experience of the Director of the State Museum 

 that a majority of the visitors to the Geological Hall have not 

 had the advantage of an elementary training in geology and 

 therefore do not obtain from the collections such information as 

 they might receive if they fully understood their purpose and 

 value. This statement applies both to the majority of the adult 

 visitors and to the pupils of the various schools who, with their 

 teachers, visit the geologic collections every year. With this 

 fact in view, it seemed important to prepare a Guide to the Study 

 of the Geologic Collections which could be sold at a nominal 

 price and therefore placed within the reach of all who might 



need it. 



As the function of .a geologic museum is to aid in the study of 

 geology, the purpose of this guide is to. supplement the collec- 

 tions with such general information as cannot be given by cabinet 

 specimens and to direct the visitor to reliable sources for more 

 detailed information. 



In 1861, Mr. Ledyard Lincklaen prepared, by direction of the 

 Regents of the University, a Guide to the Geology of New York and 

 to the State Geological GaUnet, which was published in the Four- 

 teenth Annual Report of the State Cabinet of Natural History. 

 This report being now out of print and Lincklaen's 'Guide ' having 

 been of much use in its day, though now obsolete in many re- 

 spects, it seemed desirable to replace the latter so far as possible 

 by the preparation of a new guide to the study of the collections. 

 In this undertaking the attempt has been made not so much to 

 write a new book as to put into convenient form all information 

 necessary to the purpose in view. 



