332 The American Geologist. "^^^^^^ ^^'^"■ 
studies in the plateau region with the facihties afiforded by 
the Powell survey, the results of which appeared in his now 
well known report on the Geology of the High Plateaus of 
Utah, a quarto volume of 307 pages, with an atlas. 
Powell's active work as a g-eologist practically ceased 
with the report on the Uintah mountains, above noted, al- 
though in 1874, 1875 he gave much attention to the irregu- 
larities of the land laws in the west and published in 1887 a 
work on the lands of the arid region. 
In March, 1881, he assumed the directorship of the U. S. 
Geological Survey on the resignation of Glarence King. 
From this time until his voluntary retirement from the survey 
in 1895, during which time he was also the head of the Bu- 
reau of American Ethnology, his duties were necessarily al- 
most wholly of an executive character. Under his admin- 
istration the survey grew from a small organization, the head- 
quarters of wdiich were in the northeast corner of the present" 
U. S. National Museum building, and with annual appropri- 
ations amounting to $156,000, to one which, at the time of 
his relinquishment, was receiving appropriations of nearly 
half a million dollars annually. 
It is upon his success as an administrator rather than as 
a geologist that Powell's fame must clearly rest, although 
the impetus wdiich his work on the Grand Canon and Uintah 
Mountain region gave to the study of physiographic geology 
can never be lost sight of, Powell was eminently a mag- 
netic man. More than this, he believed thoroughly in giving 
every man an opportunity to show what there was in him. 
Always accessible, even to the least of his employes, always 
interested in their welfare, he was, nevertheless, in touch 
with the leading thinkers and workers in all l)ranches of sci- 
ence. After his retirement from the survey (in 1894), a mat- 
ter which was brought about in part, at least, through faiL'ng 
health, his amputated arm being a source of great periodic 
pain, he limited himself mainly to abstruse psychological prob- 
lems and the directorship of the American Bureau of Eth- 
nology. 
The immediate cause of his death, it should be stated, 
was a cerebral hemorrhage. 
