The Mississippi Survey. — Hilgard. 299 
by the previous joint expedition of Harper and myself in 1855, 
viz : from the southern border of the cretaceous area, near Co- 
lumbus, down the Chickasawhay and Pascagoula valleys to the 
sea coast; along the coast to Pearl river, up that river to Co- 
lumbia, Marion county, and thence across to the Mississippi ;. 
thence northward along the eastern border of the loess region 
to the belt of marine tertiary, which I also examined more in 
detail between Jackson and Vicksburg. All these observations 
only served to confirm and complete my previous conclusions ; 
the onlv new point being the examination of the perplexing 
aspects under which the "Port Hudson group" (then provision- 
ally designated by me as "Coast Pliocene"), appears on the 
shores of Mississippi Sound. I was not long in rejecting all 
ideas of its direct connection with the Grand Gulf strata ; but 
its true character of a littoral member of the deposits of the 
loess epoch did not become apparent to me until, later on, I had 
the opportunity of studying, connectedly, the geology of south- 
ern Louisiana.* 
Returning from the field somewhat earlier than usual I be- 
gan the arrangement of materials for a report, to be presented 
at the legislative session of i859-'6o, with a view to its publica- 
tion and the procurement of a better endowment for the survev. 
As an earnest of the work done, I put up a collection of 
soils and marls, gathered during the three years' work, and had 
it on exhibition at the State Fair held at Jackson in November. 
It excited a good deal of attention and newspaper comment, 
and gave a favorable turn to public opinion, previously aroused 
by frequent communications of results made by me to agricul- 
tural and other papers of the state. Outside of the fair week 
I carried on the work of analysis and writing, simultaneouslv 
and unremittingly; the only assistance received being that of 
the legislature convened in December, 1859. But there was 
cataloguing of the tertiary fossils by IVof. \V. D. Moore, then 
holding the chair of English literature at the University of 
Mississippi. The manuscrint was not nearl}- completed when 
enough to satisfy a special committee that it should be printed, 
and that the working facilities should be enlarged. 
The bill reported by that committee and afterwards ])assed 
with little difficulty by the legislature, makes no radical changes 
*See Smith's Contra. 8ci., Memoir No. 248. above referred to. 
