The Mississippi Siirz'cy.- — Hilgard. 295 
At the legislative session of 1856-'/, however. Harper, by 
strenuous effort, procured the passage of an act entitled "An 
Act to provide for the printing of the Second Annual Report 
of the Agricultural and Geological Survey of the State, and 
for other purposes," approved January 31, 1857. The sub- 
stantial provisions of this act were, first, the complete separa- 
tion of the survey from all connection with the State Univer- 
sity ; second, that the survey should be prosecuted to comple- 
tion according to the provisions of the previous act, "by a state 
geologist, to be appointed b}' the governor, and to receive a 
salary of two thousand dollars per annum, to be furnished 
with such an outfit as may be necessar}-, to be provided under 
the direction of the governor : he shall also keep an exact ac- 
count of his expenses in making said survey, and submit the 
same to the examination of the governor, who shall issue his 
requisition upon the treasury for the amount, provided the 
sum shall not exceed one thousand dollars per annum." An 
appropriation of twelve hundred dollars was also made for the 
purchase of chemical apparatus for making analyses, and the 
state geologist was authorized (as a measure of economy sug- 
gested by himself), to "occupy as a laboratory the two front 
rooms in the second story of the penitentiary building ; and 
he shall be allowed the assistance of one convict, to be named 
by the inspectors, to aid him in keeping his apparatus in good 
order." It was also ordered "that five thousand copies of Pro- 
fessor Harper's report be printed," and thereafter distributed 
in accordance with the provisions of the former act. The sum 
of thirty-five hundred dollars was appropriated for this publi- 
cation, and Harper entered upon the office on March i, 1857. 
but was voted compensation from the date of his resignation, 
in November preceding. The only work performed by him 
during his tenure of office under this act, was the writing and 
publication of his report, which was done under his j)ersonal 
supervision at Xew York, although, like the former re])ort. it 
bears the imprint of the state printer at Jackson. 
Of this report it need only be said that it is a literary, lin- 
guistic and scientific curiosity, and probably unique in official 
publications of its kind. It is the labored attempt of- a sciolist 
to show erudition, and to compass the impossible feat of in- 
terpreting and discussing intelligently a considerable mass of 
