x LETTER TO SECRETARIES OF ST A TE AND OF B OA RD OF REGENTS. 
about twenty-five plates, will be ready for the lithographer within a few months. 
Of the Crustacea eight plates, and of the Braehiopoda more than thirty plates 
have been printed. In addition to all this more than 800 drawings of Corals 
have been made for the final illustration of this class of fossils. 
It is scarcely necessary for me to state that, with all this work before me, 
and the necessity of preparing the material for draughtsmen and lithographers, 
whose skilled services could only be secured by constant occupation, I was unable 
to give my undivided attention to the single volume in hand. It is unfortu¬ 
nately true, moreover, that the interruptions from other causes beyond my 
control, during several successive sessions of the Legislature, have seriously 
retarded the general progress of the work, and delayed the publication of the 
present volume by at least one year. 
The complaints of the delay in the publication of the Palaeontology have been 
without actual knowledge of the real conditions, or the facts of the case; and it 
is hoped that the foregoing frank statement of the circumstances may correct these 
misapprehensions and set at rest the efforts which have, from time to time, been 
made to suspend and destroy the work. At the same time I must thankfully and 
with pride avow, that there has never been, within my knowledge, a Legislature 
of the State of New York in which there were not enough of educated, liberal and 
enlightened men to appreciate and sustain a work of this character against the 
opposition of a few who would oppose the creation and dissemination of a 
higher knowledge among the people of the State. In the Legislature of 1879, 
the Committee on Public Education, as had, in effect, been done by other com¬ 
mittees in previous years, unanimously recommended the continuation and the 
completion of this part of the Natural History of the State. 
Under many obligations for repeated acts of kindness and consideration, and 
for expressions of confidence and entouragement, I beg leave to subscribe 
myself, 
Very sincerely and respectfully, 
Your obedient servant, 
JAMES HALL. 
December 13, 1879. 
