ESSAYS, COMMUNICATIONS, &C. 
BUILDING STONES AND MARBLES. 
BY PROF. EDWARD DANIELS, STATE GEOLOGIST. 
The geological formations of Wisconsin furnish a very wide 
variety of materials for building purposes. We have sand¬ 
stones, limestones, slates and granites in abundance. There 
are very few localities where good stone for ordinary uses or 
rough dressing may not be conveniently and cheaply obtained. 
Many of our quarries furnish stone of fine quality for substan¬ 
tial and permanent edifices, and susceptible of very considera¬ 
ble ornamentation under the chisel. We have limestones that 
take a polish, and are sufficiently crystalline to rank as Mar¬ 
bles. In the selection of stone there is much room for the 
exercise of judgment, and considerable practical geology is 
brought into use. From the want of it we see structures 
reared at great cost, and designed to last for centuries, going 
to decay before the generation by which they were built.— 
Both in our own country and in Europe we have numerous 
examples of this kind. In more common uses, as in dwelling 
houses, laying of side-walks, door-steps, chimneys, furnace- 
floors, &c., losses from imperfect knowledge of stone and its 
capacity to endure the atmospheric changes, are constantly 
