1 70 IJ. H. Whichell on the Taconic 
inappropriate for tJiat reason. It is legitimate hereto enquire 
■what constitutes the Taconic mountains. Fortunately some old 
maps and definitions of the Taconic mountains exist. Dr. 
Emmons constructed a geological map of the state of New York 
in 1844, intended to accompany his report on the Agriculture of 
New York, but it was never distributed with that volume, and al- 
though printed and delivered by the contractors it had been 
lost.' In the recent removal of some of the effects of the New 
York State Museum into the old capitol at Albanv the edition 
was found stored away in a neglected room, and the most of it 
js now in the possession of professor James Hall, who in April, 
1 8S7, distributed copies to the American committee of the Inter- 
national Congress of Geologists. This map shows the distribu- 
tion of the Taconic rocks according to the ideas of Dr. Emmons. 
It is a reprint, in the main, of the map which accompanied the 
first reports, but is changed in the eastern part, to I'epresent the 
Taconic svstem. This extends in a belt from the south cover- 
ing Columbia, Rensselaer, and Washington counties, and, pass- 
ing into Vermont, forms a belt along the east side of lake 
Champlain and runs into Canada. Topograph}-^ is a subor- 
dinate feature of this map, but the main mass of the Taconic 
mountains is shown on the boundary line between New York 
and Massachusetts. His description in 1842 (Geology of the 
cond district, p. 136) is in these words: "Lies along both 
sides of the Taconic range of mountains, whose direction is 
nearly north and south or for a great distance parallel with 
the botindo.rv line between the states of New York, Connecti- 
cut, Massachusetts and Vermont." His description in 1844 contains 
these woi-ds: "In Massachusetts and Vermont, as in New York, 
what has usually been denominated the primary range skirts 
the Taconic system upon the east, and forms with it, parallel 
belts of low mountain ranges." Nothing farther is needed 
to show that Dr. Emmons regarded the Taconic hills as ex- 
tending in subordinate spurs and ridges, from the typical region 
many miles further north, passing into Rensselaer and Washing- 
1 Dr. Emmons in some later correspondence referred to the disap- 
pearance of this map, and intimated that it has been surreptitiouslyde- 
strojed. 
