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..OURED GEOLOaCAIJY.

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LyelVs First Vis^t to North America^

TRAVELS

NORTH AMERICA,

CANADA, AND NOVA SCOTIA.

WITB

(Sfeological (f^bsetbatfons.

^i^

BY SIR CHARLES LYELL, F.R.S.

AUTHOR OF *'PRINCIPLB8 OP OBOLOOY," '*7aNUAL OF BLBMENTARY
QBOLOGY," BTC.

IN TWO VOLUMES. — VOL. L

L9-h

SECOND EDITION.

185-5"

V. 1

LONDON:
JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE

STREET. *

1855.

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3TRD3-E:YE YIEW CF TBE falls of NL\(;AHA < AD-JA^

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NIA(;ARA ^ i^D-:AC£:IT COTI_MTPT.

J)jmS\) GEOLOGfCALlY.

o^ DnvziJs

I)a\ i lilp;}).*- liif- *■; •iiHyii-ji.

By the same Author,
A SECOND VISIT TO THE UNITED STATES,

1815-f). Third Edition. 2 vols. Post 8vo. 12«.

A MANUAL OF ELEMENTARY GEOLOGY ; or, the
Ancient Chances of the Eaktii and its Inhabitants, as illustrated
by its Geological Monuments. Fifth Edition. With 750 Woodcuts.
8vo.

PRINCIPLES OF GEOLOGY; or, the Modern Changes
of the Eautu and its Inuaditants, as illustrative of Geology. Ninth
Edition. With Woodcuts. 8vo. 18».

London :
A. and G. A. Spottiswoodb,
New-Street-Square.

GEORGE TICKNOR, ESQ.

OP BOSIOX, MASSACHUSETTS.

STATES,

Y ; or, the

IS ilUistratpd
Woodcuts.

N Changes

logy. Ninth

My dear Mr. Ticknor,

I am glad to have your permission to
dedicate these volumes to you, in remembrance
I of the many happy days spent in your society,
and in that of your family and literary friends
at Boston ; a remembrance Avhich would be
without alloy, were it not for my frequent
regrets that the broad Atlantic should separate
so many congenial souls whom we br-th of us
number among our friends in Europe and
America.

Believe me,

With feelings of great regard,
Ever faithfully yours,

Charles Eyell.

London, June 12. 184o.

• — vj i ura*— T"-- ■ •*•

PllEFACE.

The reader is reminded that the general map of the
geology of the United States and Canada forms the
frontispiece of the second volume, and that the line
of my route is traced upon it in the manner de-
scribed in the explanation of the map at Vol. 11.
p. 238.

As the present work embraces a great variety of
subjects to which my thoughts were turned during
my travels in North America, I have endeavoured
to confine myself as far as possible to the communica-
tion of such scientific matter as I thought might be
of interest to the general reader. For a more de-
tailed account of my geological observations alluded
to in the course of these volumes, I must refer to
the following published papers and abstracts of
memoirs read to the Geological Society of London.

1. Letter to Dr. Fitton on the Blossberg Coal
District and Stigmaria: Proceedings of the
Geological Society y vol. iii. p. 554. 1841.

?1 riiKTACE.

2. Recession of tlie Falls of Niagara : Ih'ul. vol.

ill. p. a9.5. 1842. licsiimctl, vol. iv, p. 10.
1843.

3. Tertlaiy Formations In Virginia and other
parts of the United States : Ihid. vol. ill. [).
735. 1842.

4. Fossil Foot-Prints of I5irds and Ini^jrcsslons

of Kaln-drops in Cc^nnectlent A'alley. Ihid.
vol. iii. p. 793. 1842.

5. Tertiary Strata of jNIartha's Vineyard in
Massachusetts: IJt'ul. vol. Iv. p. 31. 1843.

6. On the Geolocrical Po*»Ition of the Mastodon
gifl^nitcus, and other Keniains at Big Bone
Lick, Kentucky, and other Localities In the
United States. Jhid. vol. iv. p. 36. 1843.

7. On upright Fossil Trees found in the Coal
Strataof Cumberland, Nova Scotia; Stllinum's
Journal, vol. xlv. Xo. 2. p. 353. 1843.

8. Coal Formations, Gypsum, and ^larinc Lime-
stones of Nova Scotia : Ibid. p. 356.

9. Bed of Plumbago and Anthracite in Mica-

schist, near AVorcester, Massachusetts, with
Appendix containing Analyses by Dr. Percy :
Quarterly Journ. of Geol. Soc, No. 2. p. 416.
May, 1845.
10. Cretaceous Strata of New Jersey, with Ap-
pendix, on the Fossil Corals of the same, by
Mr. Lonsdale: Ibid. No. 1. p. 301. Feb. 1845-

PREFACE.

vii

: Ibid. vol.
. iv. p. ID.

and other
. vol. iii. p.

fiuprefjsion:^
llcv. Ilnd,

ineyard in
. 1843.
3 Mastodon
Big Bone
itictj in the
;6. 1843.
n tlie Coal
; SilUnuins
143.

irine Limc-
)6.

3 in Mica-
isetts, with
Dr. Percy :
». 2. p. 416.

11. Miocene Formations of Virginia and North

Carolina, &c., with Appendix, on Fossil Corals,
by INIr. Lonsdale : read to the Geol. Soc,
March, 184.5. Preparing for publication,
Ibid. No. 4.

12. On the AVhitc Limestone of South Carolina
and Georgia, and the Eocene Strata of other
parts of tlie U. S., witli Appendix, on the
Corals, by Mr. Lonsdale : read to the Geol.
Soc, INIarch, 1845. Preparing for publi-
cation, Ibid. No. 4.

Abstracts of most of these papers have also ap-
peared in Silliman's " American Journal of Science
and Arts," for the corresponding years.

London, June 14tli, 1845.

', with Ap-
e same, by
Feb. 1845-

I 1

i'm

(KM**!*-***- -

g .g. ' j.L ■ M .wn.i. iM Liw

CONTENTS

THE FIRST VOLUME.

CHAPTER I.

Voyage. — Harbour of Halifax. — Excursions near Boston. —
Difference of Plants from European Species, and Correspond-
ence of Marine Shells. — Hesemblance of Drift, Erratics, and
furrowed Rocks, to those of Sweden. — Springfield. — New-
haven. — Scenery of the Hudson. — Albany. — Geological
Surveys. — Mohawk Valley. — Ancient or Silurian Form-
ations. — Prosperity and rapid Progress of the People.
— Lake Ontario. — Tortoises. — Fossil remains of Mas-
todon --«--- Page 1

CHAPTER II.

Distant and near View of the Falls of Niagara. — Whether the
Falls have receded from Queenston to their present Site. —
Geographical Features of the Region. — Course of the River
abov3 and below the Falls. — Recent Proofs of Erosion. —
Historical Data in the Works of Hennepin and Kalm. — , Geo-
logical Evidence derived from Fluviatile Strata or Remnants
of an old River-bed in Goat Island and elsewhere. — Diffi-
culty of computing the Rate of the retrograde Movement. —
Varying Hardness and Thickness of the Rocks undermined. —
Future Recession. — Age of the Drift and Limestone Escarp-
ments. — Successive Changes which preceded and accompanied
the Origin of the Falls. — Reflections on the Lapse of past
Time -..«•« 27

rt- r

CONTENTS.

CIIArTER ITT.

Tour from the Niagara to the Northern Frontier of Pennsyl-
vania. — Ancient Gypsiferous Formation of New York. —
Fossil Mastodon at Geneseo. — Scenery. — Sudden Growth
of New Towns. — Coal of Blossberg, and Resemblance to
British Coal Measures. — Stigmaria. — Humming Birds. —
Nomenclature of Places. — Ilelderberg IVIountains and Fossils.
Refractory Tenants. — Travelling in the States. — Politeness
to "Women. — Canal-boat. — Domestic Service. — Progress of

Civilisation. — Philadelphia.

-Fire-engines

Page 54

*.*»»

CHAPTER IV.

Excursion to New Jersey. — Cretaceous Rocks compared to
European. — General Analogy of Fossils, and Distinctness of
Species. — Tour to the Anthracite Region of the AUeghanios in
Pennsylvania. — Long Parallel Ridges and Valleys of these
Mountains. — Pottsville. — Absence of Smoke. — Fossil Plants
same as in Bituminous Coal. — Stijimaria). — Great thickness
of Strata. — Origin of Anthracite. — Vast Area of the Ap-
palachian Coal-field. — Progressive Debituminization of Coal
from West to East. — General Remarks on the different Groups
of Rocks between the Atlantic and the Mississippi. — Law of
Structure of the Ap{)alachian Chain discovered by the Pro-
fessors Rogers. — Increased folding and dislocation of Strata
on the south-eastern Flank of the Appalachians. — Theory of

the Origin of this Mountain Chain

CHAPTER V

Wooded Ridges of the Alleghany Mountains. — German Patois
in Pennsylvania. — Lehigh Summit ^line. — Effects of Ice
during a Flood on the Delaware. — Election of a Governor at
Trenton and at Philadelphia. — Journey to Boston. — Au-
tumnal Tints of the Foliage. — Boston the Scat of Commerce»
of Government, and of a University. — Lectures at the Lowell
Institute. — Influence of Oral Instruction in Literature and

CONTENTS.

titior of Ponnsyl-
f New York. —
Sudden Growth
Resemblance to
inmlnjj Birds. —
itains and Fossils,
ates. — Politeness
ice. — Progress of
Page 54

cks compared to
I Distinctness of
he Alleghanies in
Valleys of these
e. — Fossil Plants
-Great thickness
A.rea of the Ap-
linization of Coal
3 different Groups
jissippi. — Law of
ered by the Pro-
location of Strata
ians. — Theory of
77

— German Patois

— Eifects of Ice
of a Governor at
Boston. — Au-
cat of Commerce)
ires at the Lowell
in Literature and

Science. — Fees of Public Lecturers. — Educational Funds
sunk in costly Buildings. — Advantages of Anti-building Clauses .
— Blind Asylum. — Lowell Factories. — National Schools. —
Ecjuality of Sects. — Society in Boston

Page 101

CHAPTER VI.

Fall of Snow and Sleigh-driving at Boston. — Journey to New-
haven, — Ichthyolites of Durham, Connecticut. — Age of Red
Sandstone. — Income of Farmers. — Baltimore. — Washington.
— National Museum. — Natural impediments to the growth of
Washington. — WHiy chosen for the Capital. — Richmond,
Virginia. — Eflects of Slave-labour. — Loav Region on the
Atlantic Border, occupied by Tertiary Strata. — Infusorial
Bed at Richmond. — Miocene Shells and Corals in the Cliffs
of the James River compared with Fossils of the European
Crag and Faluns. — Analogy of Forms and difference of
Species. — Proportion of Species. — Commencement of the
present Geographical Distribution of Mollusca. - 124

CHAPTER VIL

Pine Barrens of Virginia and North Carolina. — Railway
Train stopped by Snow and Ice. — The Great Dismal Swamp.
— Soil formed entirely of Vegetable Matter. — Rises higher
than the contiguous firm Land. — Buried Timber. — Lake
the Middle.— The Origin of Coal illustrated by the

Great Dismal. — Objections to the Theory of an ancient
Atmosphere highly charged with Carbonic Acid - 140

CHAPTER VIII.

Tour to Charleston, South Carolina. — Facilities of Locomotion.
— Augusta. — Voyage down the Savannah River. — Shell
Bluff. — Slave-labour. — Fever and Ague. — Millhaven. —
Pine Forests of Georgia. — Alligators and Land-Tortoises. —
Warmth of Climate in January. — Tertiary Strata on the
Savannah. — Fossil Remains of IVIastodon and IMylodon near
Savannah. — Passports required of Slaves. — Cheerfulness of
the Negroes - - - - - 153

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CONTENTS.

CHAPTER IX.

Return to Charleston. — Fossil Human Skeleton. — Geographical
Distribution of Quadrupeds in North America. — Severe Frost
in 1835 in South Carolina. — White Limestone of the Cooper
River and Santee Canal. — Referred to the Eocene Period,
and not intermediate between Tertiary and Chalk. — Lime-
sinks. — Species of Shells common to Eocene Strata in America
and Europe. — Causes of the increased Insalubrity of the Low
Region of South Carolina. — Condition of the Slave Population.
— Cheerfulness of the Negroes : their Vanity. — State of Animal
Existence. — Invalidity of Marriages. — The Coloured Popula-
tion multiply faster than the Whites. — Effects of the inter-
ference of Abolitionists. — Laws against Education. — Gradual
Emancipation equally desirable for the Whites and the

Coloured Race -

Page 171

CHAPTER X.

Wilmington, N. C. — Mount Vernon. — Return to Philadelphia.
— Reception of Mr. Dickens. — Museum and Fossil Human
Bones. — Penitentiary. — Churches. — Religious Excitement.

— Coloured People of Fortune. — Obstacles to their obtaining
political and social Equality. — No natural Antipathy between
the Races. — Negro Reservations - - 196

CHAPTER XL

Philadelphia. — Financial Crisis. — Payment of State Dividends
suspended. — General Distress and private Losses of the Ame-
ricans. — Debt of Pennsylvania. — Public Works. — Direct
Taxes. — Deficient Revenue. — Bad Faith and Confiscation. —
Irresponsible Executive. — Loan refused by European Capi-
talists in 1842. — Good Faith of Congress during the War o^
1812-14. — Effects of Universal Suffrage. — Fradulent voting"

— Aliens. — Solvency and Good Faith of the Majority of the
States. — Confidence of American Capitalists. — Reform of
the Electoral Body. — General Progress of Society, and Pro-
spects of the Republic - - - - 215

CONTENTS.

Xlll

1. — Geographical
a. — Severe Frost
3ne of the Cooper
le Eocene Period,
i Chalk. — Lime-
Strata in America
ubrity of the Low
Slave Population .
— State of Animal
Coloured Popula-
ects of the inter-
cation. — Gradual
Whites and the
- Page 171

n to Philadelphia,
tid Fossil Human
pous Excitement,
to their obtaining
LUtipathy between
196

f State Dividends
osses of the Ame-
Works. — Direct
id Confiscation. —
y European Capi-
uring the War o'
Fradulent voting"
le Majority of the
ists. — Reform of
Society, and Pro-
215

CHAPTER XII.

New York City. — Geology. — Distribution of Erratic Blocks in
Long Island. — Residence in New York. — Effects on Society
of increased Intercourse of distant States. — Separation of the
Capital and Metropolis. — Climate. — Geology of the Taconic
Mountains. — Stratum of Plumbago and Anthracite in the
Mica Schist of Worcester. — Theory of its Origin. — Lectures
for the Working Classes. — Fossil Foot-prints of Birds in Red
Sandstone. — Mount Holyoke. — Visit to the Island of Martha's
Vineyard. — Fossil Walrus. — Indians. - - Page 238

CHAPTER Xni.

Meeting of Association of American Geologists at Boston. —
Popular Libraries in New England. — Large Sale of Literary
Works in the United States. — American Universities. —
Harvard College, near Boston. — English Universities. — Pe-
culiarities of their System. — Historical Sketch of the Causes of
these Peculiarities not of ^Medieval Origin. — Collegiate Corpo-
rations. — Their altered Relation to the English Universities
after the Reformation. — Constitution given to Oxford by
Leicester and Laud. — System of Public Teaching, how super-
seded by the Collegiate. — Effects of the Change. — Oxford
Examination Statute of 1800. — Its subsequent Modifica-
tion and Results. — Rise of Private Tutors at Oxford and Cam-
bridge — Consequences of this Innovation. — Struggle at
Oxford in 1839 to restore the Professorial System. — Causes
of its Rejection. — Tractarianism. — Supremacy of Eccle-
siastics. — Youthful Examiners. — Cambridge. — Advocacy
of the System followed there. — Influence of the English
Academical Plan on the Culti«'ation of the Physical Sciences,

and all branches of Progressive Knowledge. — Remedies and
Reforms -----. 261

Tlai

Plat

Plat
Lo

for

LIST OF PLATES AND MAPS,

AND

DIRECTIONS TO BINDER.

VOL. I.

Plate I. Bird's-cyc View of the Falls of Niagara and
Adjacent Country, coloured geologically.

Frontispiece to Vol. T.
Plate III. Map of the Niagara District. To face Vol. I. p. QQ.

Plate IV. Fac-simile of a View of Niagara Falls, by Father
Louis Hennepin. — (From the original Utrecht edition, 1697.)

Page 35.

Plate V. Fossil Mammalian Remains from the Tertiary
Strata of Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts. Page 258.

VOL. IL

Plate II. Geological Map of the United States, Canada,
&c., compiled from the State Surveys of the U. S., and other
sources. Frontispiece to Vol. II.

Plate VI. View of the Great Coal Seam on the Mononaghela
at BroAvnsville, Pennsylvania. TofaceVol. II. p. 27.

Plate VII. Recent Foot-prints of Birds, the Sandpiper
(Tringa minuta), on the Red Mud of the Bay of Fundy,
Nova Scotia — natural size. To face Vol. IL p, IQS,

JTor the Description of the Plates and Maps, see

Vol. IL p. 235.

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JOURNAL

or A

TOUR IN NORTH AMERICA,

IN 1841-2.

CHAPTER 1/

Voynge. — Harbour of Halifax. — Excursions near Boston. —
Difference of Plants from European Species^ and Correspond-
tnce of Marine Shells. — Resemblance of Drift, Erratics, and
fnrroived liochs, to those of Siveden. — Springfield. — Neiv-
kaven. — Scenery of the Hudson. — Albany. — Geological

; Surveys. — Mohaick Valley. — Ancient or Sihirian Form-
ations. — Prosperity and rapid Progress of the People. — Lake
Ontai'io. — Tortoises. — Fossil Remains of Mastodon.

July 20. 1841. — Sailed from Liverpool for Boston,
U. S., in the steam-ship Acadia, which held her
course as straight as an arrow from Cape Clear
in Ireland to Halifax in Nova Scotia, making
between 220 and 280 miles per day.

After the monotony of a week spent on the open
sea. we were amused when we came near the great

VOYAGE.

Chap. I.

Cil

banks which extend from the southern point of
Newfouncllancl, by the ra])id pass^age of the steamer
through alternate belts of stationary fog and clear
spaces warmed and lighted up with bright sunshine.
Looking at the dense fog from the intermediate
sunny regions, we could hardly be persuaded that
we were not beholding land, so distinct and well-
defined was its outline, and such the varieties of
Hjrht and shade, that some of our Canadian fellow-
passengers compared it to the patches of cleared and
uncleared country t)n the north shore of the St. Law-
rence. These fogs arc caused by the meeting, over the
great banks, of the warm waters of the gulf stream
flowing from the south, and colder currents, often
charged with floating ice, from the north, by which
very opposite states in the relative temperature of the
sea and atmosphere are produced in spaces closely
contiguous. In places where the sea is warmer
than the air, fogs are generated.

AVhen the eye has been accustomed for many
days to the deep blue of the central Atlantic, the
greener tint of the sea over the banks is refreshing.
AVe were within 150 miles of tlie southern point
of Newfoundland when we crossed these banks,
over which the shallowest water is said to be about
thirty-five fathoms deep. The bottom consists of
fine sand, which must be often ploughed up by ice-

T|
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Chap. I.

HARBOUR OF HALIFAX.

bergs, for several of them were seen aground here
by some of our passengers on the 31st of July last.
The captain tells us that the worst months for
crossnig the Atlantic to and from Halifax are Fe-
bruary and March, and the most agreeable ones,
July, August, and September. Tlie nearer we ap-
proached the American coast, the more beautiful
and brilliant were the sunsets. We sometimes com-
pared the changing hues of the clouds and sky to
the blue and red colours in a pigeon's neck.

July 31. — On the eleventh day of our voyage we
sailed directly into the harbour of Halifax, which by
its low hills of granite and slate, covered with birch
and spruce fir, reminded me more of a Norwegian
fiord, such as that of Christiania, than any other
place I had seen. I landed here for six hours, with
my wife, during which we had time to drive about
the town, and see the museum, where I was shown
a large fossil tree filled with sandstone, recently sent
from strata containing coal in the interior. I re-
solved to examine these before returning to England,
as they appeared, by the description given us, to
aft'ord the finest examples yet known in the world
of petrified trees occurring in their natural or erect
position.

Letters, which we had written on the voyage,
being now committed to the post-office at Halifax,

B 2

' r'l

\ '

■\\

if'

AKUIVAL AT BOf^TOX.

CnAP. I.

were taken up next day hy the Calc(loni»a steam-ship
for England, and in less than a month from the time
of our quitting: London, our friends in remote parts
of great Britain (in Scotland and in Devonshire)
were reading an account of the harbour of Halifax,
of the Micmac Indians with their Esfiuimaux features,
paddling about in canoes of birch bark, and other
novelties seen on the shores of the New World. It
required the aid of the recently established railroads
at home, as well as the Atlantic steam-packets, to
render such rapid correspondence possible.

August 2. — A run of about thirty hours carried
us to Boston, which we reached in twelve and a
half days after leaving Liverpool. The heat here is
intense, the harbour and city beautiful, the air clear
and entirely free from smoke, so that the shipping
may be seen far off, at the end of many of the streets.
The Tremont Hotel merits its reputation as one of
the best in the world. KecoUecting the contrast of
every thing French when I first crossed the straits
of Dover, I am astonished, after having traversed the
wide ocean, at the resefnblance of every thing I see
and hear to things familiar at home. It has so often
happened to me in our own island, without travelling
into those parts of Wales, Scotland, or Ireland, where
they talk a perPectly distinct language, to encounter
provincial dialects which it is difficult to comprehend.

III

nl
t

Chap. I.

EXCURSIONS NEAK BOSTOX.

that I wonder at findinj^ the people here so very
English. It' the metropolis of New England be a
type of a large part of the United States, the
industry of Sam Slick, and other writers, in collect-
ing together so many diverting Amerl 'danisms Jind so
much original slang, is truly great, or their inven-
tive powers still greater.

I made excursions to the neighbourhood of Boston
through Roxbury, Cambridge, and other places, with
a good botanist, to whom I had brought letters of
introduction. Although this is not the best season
for wild flowers, the entire distinctness of the trees,
shrubs, and plants, from those on the other side of
the Atlantic, affords a constant charm to the Euro-
pean traveller. AYe admired the drooping American
elm, a picturesque tree; and saw several kinds of
sumach, oaks witJi deeply indented leaves, dwarf
birches, and several wild roses. Large commons
without heaths reminded me of the singular fact that
no species of heath is indigenous on the American
continent. We missed also the small " crimson-
tipped" daisy on the green lawns, and were told
that they have been often cultivated with care, but
are found to wither when exposed to the dry air and
bright sun of this climate. When weeds so common
with us cannot be reared here, we cease to wonder
at the dissimilarity of the native flora of the New

B 3

^'^^

flM

' M

* r

MAllINE shells:

Chap. I.

i ■

World. Yet whenever the aboriginal forests are
cleared, we see orchards, gardens, and arable lands,
filled with the same fruit trees, the same grain and
vegetables, as in Europe, so bountifully has Nature
provided that the plants most useful to man should
be capable, like himself, of becoming cosmopolites.

Aiiff. 5. — Went by railway to deliver letters and
pay some visits at Nahant, situated on a promontory
of the coast, about ten miles N.E. of Boston, where
I examined the rocks of hornblende and syenite,
traversed by veins of greenstone and basalt which
often intersect *jach other. The surfjice of the rocks,
wherever the incumbent gravel or drift has been
recently removed, is polished, furrowed, and striated,
as in tlie north of Europe, especially in Sweden, or
in Switzerland, near the great glaciers.

On the beach or bar of sand and shingle, which
unites the peninsula with the main land, I collected
many recent shells, and was immediately struck with
the agreement of several of the most abundant
species with our ordinary British littoral shells.
Among them were Purpura lapillus, Turbo {lAtto-
rina) rudis, 3ff/tilus ednlis, Modiola pajmana, Mya
arenaria, besides others which were evidently geo-
graphical representatives of our common species;
such as Naasa trivittafa, allied to our N. reticulata,
Turbo palUatus Say, allied to, if not the same as, our

tl
o|

AP. I.

Chap. I. IDENTITY WITH BRITISH SPECIES. 7

common Turbo neritoides, &c. I afterwards added
largely to the list of corresponding species and forms,
and Dr. Gould of Boston showed me his collection of
the marine shells of Massachusetts and the adjoining
ocean, and gave me a list of 70 out of 197 species
which he regarded as identical with shells from
Europe. After comparing these on my return, with
the aid of several able conchologists, I am convinced
that the greater part of these identifications arc
correct ; and, in the place of some considered as doubt-
ful, there arc others not enumerated in Dr. Gould's
catalogue, which may be substituted, so as to es-
tablish a result for which few geologists were pre-
pared, viz. that one third, or about 35 per cent, of the
marine shells of this part of America are the same as
those of the ojiposite side of the Atlantic ; a large
part of the remainder consisting of geograj)hical
representatives, and a fraction only of the whole
affording characteristic or j^eculiar forms. I shall
have many opportunities of pointing out the geo-
logical bearing of this curious, and to me very un-
expected, fact.

Several excavations made for railways in the
neighbourhood of Boston, through mounds of stra-
tified and unstratified gravel and sand, and also
through rock, enabled me to recognise the exact
resemblance of this part of New England to the less

B 4

• i

RESEMBLANCE OF DRIFT ROCKS Chap. I.

I i

elevated regions of Norway and Sweden, where
granitic rocks are strewed over irreg-ularly wdth
sand and blocks of stone, forming a gently undulating
country with numerous ponds and small lakes.
Indeed, had I not been constantly reminded that I
WHS in America, by the distinctness of the plants,
and the birds flying about in the woods, the geo-
logical ])hcnomena would have led me to suppose
myself in Scotland, or some otlier part of Northern
Europe. These heaps of sand and pebbles are
entirely devoid of shells or organic remains, and
occasionally huge rounded blocks, brought from a
great distance, rest upon them, or are buried in
them. The heaps are mainly composed, however, of
tlie materials of neighbouring rocks. At some points
the superficial gravel has been pierced to the depth
of 100, and even more than 200, feet, without the
solid rock being reached ; but more commonly the
loose detritus is of moderate thickness, and, when
removed, a polished surface of granite, gneiss, or
mica schist, is exposed, exhibiting a smooth surface,
with occasional scratches or straight parallel furrows.
Here and there, rounded and flattened domes of
smoothed rock, similar in shape to the ''roches mouton-
noos " which border the Alpine glaciers, are observable.
The dav after I landed, an excavation recentlv made
for tlie monument now erecting on Bunker's Hill,

Chap. I.

TO THOSE OF SWEDEN.

enabled me to recognise the likeness of this drift to
that of Scandinavia, and every day since I have
seen fresh proofs of the complete correspondence of
these remote districts. Professor Hitchcock has
shown that in New England the parallel grooves or
furrows have a general direction nearly north and
south, but usually ten or fifteen degrees to the west
of north. I have already seen, at Nahant and else-
where, some marked deviations from this rule, which,
however, is correct in the main, and these markings
have been found to prevail at all heights in New
England, even in mountains more than 2000 feet
high.

I have already observed several rounded boulders
with one flat side scratched and furrowed, as if
it had been held firmly in one position when
frozen into ice, and rubbed against a hard rocky
bottom.

There is here, as in Sweden, so great an extent of
low country remote from any high mountains, that
we cannot attribute the effects above described to
true glaciers descending in the open air from the
higher regions to the plains. If we adopt the glacial
theory, wc must suppose the country to have been
submerged, and that the northern drift was brouglit
here Ijy large bodies of floating ice, which, by re-
peatedly running aground on the bottom of the sea

B 5

t :

iiP'

DEPARTURE FOR NEWIIAVEN.

Chap. I.

J'\

for tliousancls of years, and forcing along the sand
under their enormous weight, polished and furrowed
the rocky bottom, and on the melting of the ice, let
fall their burden of stones or erratic blocks, together
with mud and pebbles.

When we recollect that Boston is situated in the
latitude of Rome, or in that of the north of Spain,
and that the northern drift and erratic blocks in
Euro]ie arc first met with about the 50th degree of
latitude, and then increase as we travel towards the
pole; there seems ground for presuming, that the
greater cold w^hich now marks the climate of North
America had begun to prevail long before the pre-
sent distribution of land and sea in the northern
hemisphere, and before the present climates were
established. Perhaps, even in the glacial period of
geology, the lines of equal winter's cold, when drawn
from Europe to North America, made a curve of
about 10° to the southward, as in our own times.

Auff. 9. — After a Aveek spent very agreeably at
Boston, we started for Newhaven in Connecticut,
going the first hundred miles on an excellent railway
in three hours and a half, for three dollars each. The
speed of the railways in this State, the most populous
in the Union, is far greater than elsewhere, and I am
told that they are made with American capital, and
for the most part pay good interest. There are

.i r I' •

Chap. I.

SPRINGFIELD.

no tunnels, and so few embankments that they afford
the traveller a good view of the country. The
number of small lakes and ponds, such as are seen in
the country between Lund and Stockholm, in Swe-
den, affords a pleasing variety to the scenery, and
they are as useful as they are ornamental. The
water is beautifully clear, and when frozen to the
depth of many feet in winter, supplies those large
cubical masses of ice, which are sawed and trans-
ported to the principal cities throughout the Union,
and even shipped to Calcutta, crossing the equator
twice in their outward voyage. It has been truly
said, that this part of New England owes its wealth
to its industry, the soil being sterile, the timber
small, and there being no staple commodities of
native growth, except ice and granite.

In the inland country between Boston and Spring-
field, we saw some sand-hills like the dunes of blown
sand near the coast, which were probably formed on
the sea-side before the country was elevated to its
present height. We passed many fields of maize, or
Indian corn, before arriving at Springfield, which is
a beautiful village, with fine avenues of the American
elm on each side of the wide streets. From Spring-
field we descended the river Connecticut in a steam-
boat. Its banks were covered with an elegant species
of golden rod ( SoUdago), with its showy bright yellow

1 i

IIP

r \

B 6

NEWIIAVEN.

Chap. I.

if*

flowers. I have been hitherto disappointed in seeing
no large timber, and I am told that it was cut down
originally in New England without mercy, because
it served as an ambush for the Indians, since which
time it has never recovered, being consumed largely
for fuel. The Americans of these Eastern States
who visit Europe have, strange to say, derived their
ideas of noble trees more from those of our principal
English parks, than from the native forests of the
New World.

I visited Rocky Hill, near Hartford in Connec-
ticut, where the contact is seen of a large mass of
columnar trap with red sandstone. In a large quarry,
the distinct joints which divide the sandstone con-
trast finely with the divisional planes which separate
the basalt into pillars. The evidence of alteration
by heat at the point of contact is very marked, and
has been well described by Dr. Silliman in a paper on
the rocks of this place.

The town of Newhaven, with a population of
21,000 souls, possesses, like Springfield, fine avenues
of trees in its streets, which mingle agreeably with
the buildings of the university, and the numerous
churches, of which we counted more than twenty
steeples. When attending service, according to the
Presbyterian form, in the College chapel on Sunday,
I could scarcely believe I was not in Scotland.

tl
c

s
r

Chap. I.

NEWHAVEN.

In an expedition to the north of the town, accom-
panied by Professor Silliman, his son, and Mr. Per-
cival, a geologist to whom the execution of the State
Survey of Connecticut was entrusted, I examined
the red sandstone {^New Red) and intrusive volcanic
rocks (basalt and greenstone) of this neighbourhood.
Dykes of various sizes intersect the stratified rocks,
and occasionally flow in great tabular masses nearly
parallel to the strata, so as to have the picturesque
effect of cappings of columnar basalt, although Mr.
Percival has shown that they are in reality intrusive,
and alter the strata in contact both above and below.
The East and West Kocks near Newhaven, crowned
with trap, bear a strong resemblance in their outline
and general aspect to Salisbury Crags, and other hills
of the same structure near Edinburgh.

We saw in Hampden parish, lat. 41° 19', on the
summit of a high hill of sandstone, a huge erratic
block of greenstone, 100 feet in circumference, and
projecting 1 1 feet above ground. Other large trans-
ported fragments ^ave been met with more than
1000 feet above the level of the sea, and every
where straight parallel furrows appear on the smooth
surface of the rocks, where the superficial gravel and
sand are removed.

In a garden at Newhaven (August 13.) I saw, for
the first time, a humming bird on the wing. It was

Hi'

1 ::

PASSAGE TO NEW YORK.

Chap. I.

I' 5

h I

fluttering round the flowers of a Gladiolus. In the
suburbs we gathered a splendid wild flower, the
scarlet Lobelia, and a large sweet-scented water-lily.
The only singing bird which we heard was a thrush
with a red breast, which they call here the robin.
The grasshopi)ers were as numerous and as noisy as
in Italy. As we returned in the evening over some
low marshy ground, we saw several fire-flies, showing
an occasional bright sjoark. They are small beetles
resembling our male glow-worms (^Lampyris Linn.,
Pyrolampis scintillans Say).

Aug. 13. — A large steam-ship carried us from
Newhaven to New York, a distance of about ninety
miles, in less than six hours. We had Long Island
on the one side, and the main land on the other,
the scenery at first tame from the width of the
channel, but very lively and striking when this
became more contracted, and at length we seemed to
sail into the very suburbs of the great city itself,
passing between green islands, some of them covered
with buildings and villas. AYe had the same bright
sunshine which we have enjoyed ever since we
landed, and an atmosphere unsullied by the chim-
nics of countless steam-boats, factories, and houses,
of a population of more than 300,000 souls, thanks
to the remoteness of all fuel save anthracite and
wood.

Chap. 1.

SCENERY OP THE HI'DSON.

Next (lay, I went with INIr. Redficltl, well known
by his meteorological writings, across the Passaic
river to Newark in New Jersevj where we examined
quarries of the New lied Sandt«tone, and saw the
surfaces of the strata ripple-marked, and with im-
pressions of rain-drops. They also exhibit casts on
their under sides of cracks, which have been formed
by the shrinking of the layers of clay when drying.
These appearances, together with imbedded fragments
of carbonized fossil wood, such as may have been
drifted on a beach, bespeak the littoral character of
the formation on which, in many places in Con-
necticut and Massachussetts, the fossil footsteps of
birds, to which I shall afterwards allude, have been
found imprinted.

Aug. 16. — Sailed in the splendid new steam-ship
the Troy, in company with about 500 passengers,
from New York to Albany, 145 miles, at the rate
of about 16 miles an hour. When I was informed
that " seventeen of these vessels went to a mile,"
it seemed incredible, but I found that in fact the
deck measured 300 feet in length. To give a suffi-
cient supply of oxygen to the anthracite, the
machinery is made to work two bellows, which blow
a strong current of air into the furnace. The Hud-
son is an arm of the sea or estuary, about twelve
fathoms deep, above New York, and its waters are

} 1
; 'i

ALBANY.

Chap. T.

inhabited by a curious mixture of marine and fresh-
water plants and molkisca. At first on our left, or
on the western bank, we had a lofty precipice of
columnar basalt from 400 to 600 feet in height,
called the Palisades, extremely picturesque. This
basalt rests on sandstone, which is of the same age
as that before mentioned near Newhaven, but has
an opposite or westward dijo. On arriving at the
Highlands, the winding channel is closed in by steep
hills of gneiss on both sides, and the vessel often
holds her course as if bearing directly on the land.
The stranger cannot guess in which direction he is
to penetrate the rocky gorge, but he soon emerges
again into a broad valley, the blue Catskill mountains
appearing in the distance. The scenery deserves all
the praise which has been lavished upon it, and
when the passage is made in nine hours it is full of
variety and contrast.

At Albany, a town finely situated on the Hudson,
and the capital of the State of New York, I found
several geologists employed in the Government sur-
vey, and busily engaged in forming a fine museum, to
illustrate the organic remains and mineral jiroducts
of the country. This State is divided into about the
same number of counties as England, and is not
very inferior to it in extent of territory. The
legislature four years ago voted a considerable sum of

Chap. I.

GEOLOGICAL SURVEYS.

money, more than 200,000 dollars, or 40,000 guineas,
for exploring ita Natural History and mineral struc-
ture ; and at the end of the first two years several
of the geological surveyors, of whom four principal
ones were appointed, reported, among other results,
their opinion, that no coal would ever be discovered
in their respective districts. This announcement
caused no small disappointment, especially as the
neighbouring state of Pennsylvania was very rich in
coal. Accordingly, during my tour, I heard fre-
quent complaints that, not satisfied with their in-
ability to find coal themselves, the surveyors had
decided that no one else would ever be able to detect
any, having had the presumption to pass a sentence of
future sterility on the whole land. Yet, in spite of
these expressions of ill-humour, it was satisfactory
to observe that the rashness of private speculators
had received a wholesome check ; and large sums of
money, which for twenty years previously had been
annually squandered in trials for coal in rocks below
the carboniferous series, were henceforth saved to the
public. There can be little doubt that the advantage
derived to the resources of the State by the cessation
of this annual outlay alone, and the more profitable
direction since given to private enterprise, is suffi-
cient to indemnify the country, on mere utilitarian
grounds, for the sum so munificently expended by

> n

MOHAWK VALLEY.

Chap. I.

the government on geological investigations. The
resemblance of certain Silurian rocks on the banks
of the Hudson river to the bituminous shales of the
true Coal formation was the chief cause of the
deception which misled the mining adventurers of
New York. I made an excursion southwards from
Albany, with a party of geologists, to Normanskill
Creek, where there is a waterfall, to examine these
black slates, containing graptolitcs, trilobites, and
other Lower Silurian fossils. By persons ignorant
of the order of superposition and of fossil remains,
they might easily be mistaken for Coal measures,
especially as some small i)articlcs of anthracite, per-
haps of animal origin, do actually occur in them.

On leaving Albany, I determined so to plan my
route to the Falls of Niagara and back again to the
Hudson, as to enable me to sec by the way the
entire succession of mineral groups from the lowest
Silurian up to the coal of Pennsylvania. Mr. James
Hall, to whose hands the north-west division of the
geological survey of New York had been confided,
kindly offered himself as my guide. Taking the
railway to Schenectady, and along the Mohawk
valley, we first stopped at Little Falls, where we
examined the gneiss and the lowest Silurian . sand-
stone resting upon it. We then pursued our journey
along the line of the Erie Canal and the Mohawk

. r.

Chap. I. ANCIENT OR SILURIAN FORMATIONS. 19

River, stopping here and there to examine quarries
of limestone, and making a short detour through the
beautiful valley of Cedarville in Herkimer County,
where there is a fine section of the strata. After-
wards we explored the picturesque ravine through
which the Genesee flows at Rochester, the river
descending by a succession of cataracts over the
same rocks which are exjiosed farther westward on
the Niagara. The excavations also made for the
grand canal of Lockport afforded us a fine oppor-
tunity of seeing these older fossiliferous rocks laid
open to view. At this point the barges laden with
merchandise climb up, by a series of locks placed one
above the other, to the table land in which Lake
Erie is situated. In the course of this short tour, I
became convinced that we must turn to the Neio
World if we wish to see in perfection the oldest
monuments of the earth's history, so far at least as
relates to its earliest inhabitants. Certainly in no
other country are these ancient strata developed on a
grander scale, or more plentifully charged with
fossils ; and, as they arc nearly horizontal, the order
of their relative position is always clear and un-
equivocal. They exhibit, moreover, in their range
from the Hudson River to the Niagara, some fine
examples of the gradual manner in which certain
sets of strata thin out when followed for hundreds

! I

I !

20 ANCIENT OPw SILURIAN FORMATIONS. Chap. I.

of miles, while others j^rcviously wanting become
intercalated in the series. Thus, for example, some
of the limestones "which are several hundred feet
thick in the Helderbcrg Hills, near Albany, are
scarcely forty feet thicjk in the Niagara district ; and
on the other hand, the rocks over which the cataract
of Niagara is precipitated, dwindle away to such
insignificant dimensions when followed eastward to
the hills S. W. of Albany, that their place in the
series there can scarcely be recognised. Another
interesting fact may be noticed as the result even
of a cursory survey of the fossils of these North
American rocks, namely, that while some of the
species agree, the majority of them are not identical
with those found in strata, which are their equiva-
lents in age and position on the other side of the
Atlantic. Some fossils which are identical, such as
Atrypa affinis, LeptcBna depressa, and L. eit(/lt/pha,
are precisely those shells which have a great vertical
and horizontal range in Europe, — species Avhich were
capable of surviving many successive changes in the
earth's surface, and for the same reason enjoyed at
certain periods a wide geographical range. It has
been usually affirmed that in the rocks older than
the carboniferous, the fossil fauna in different i)art8
of the globe was almost every where the same ; but,
judging from the first assemblage of organic re-

Chap. I. PROSPERITY OF THE PEOPLE.

mains which I have seen here, it appears to me, that
however close the general analogy of forms may be,
there is evidence of the same law of variation in
space as now prevails in the living creation.

A few years ago, it was a fatiguing tour of many
weeks to reach the Falls of Niagara from Albany.
We are now carried along at the rate of sixteen miles
an hour, on a railway often supported on piles, through
large swamps covered with aquatic trees and shrubs,
or through dense forests, with occasional clearings,
where orchards are planted by anticipation among the
stumps, before they have even had time to run up a
log-house. The traveller views with surprise, in the
midst of so much unoccupied land, one flourishing
town after another, such as Utica, Syracuse, and
Auburn. At Rochester he admires the streets of
large houses, inhabited by 20,000 souls, where the
first settler built his log-cabin in the wilderness only
twenty-five years ago. At one point our train
stopped at a handsome new built station-house, and,
looking out at one window, we saw a group of
Indi'ins of the Oneida tribe, lately the owners of the
broad lands around, but now humbly offering for sale
a few trinkets, tach. as baskets ornamented with
porcupine quills, moccasins of moose-deer skin, and
boxes of birch-bark. At the other window stood a
well-dressed waiter handing ices and confectionary.

I-

PROSPERITY OF THE PEOPLE. Chap. I.

I' i- 111
I' J
|i I

When we reflect that some single towns, of which
the foundations were laid by persons still living, can
already number a population, equal to all the abori-
ginal hunter tribes who possessed the forests for hun-
dreds of miles around, we soon cease to repine at the
extraordinary revolution, however much we may
commiserate the unhappy fate of the disinherited race.
They who are accustomed to connect the romance
of their travels in Europe or Asia with historical re-
collections and the monuments of former glory, with
the study of masterpieces in the fine arts, or with
grand and magnificent scenery, will hardly believe the
romantic sensations which may be inspired by the
aspect of this region, where very few points of pictu-
resque beauty meet the eye, and where the aboriginal
forest has lost its charm of savage wildness by the
intrusion of railways and canals. The foreign natu-
ralist indeed sees novelty in every plant, bird, and
insect ; and the remarkable resemblances of the rocks
at so great a distance from home are to him a soiu'cc
of wonder and instruction. But there arc other
objects of intense interest, to enliven or excite the
imagination of every traveller. Here, instead of
dwelling on the past, and on the signs of pomp and
grandeur which have vanished, the mind is filled with
images of coming power and splendour. The vast
stride made by one generation in a brief moment of

! i

Chap. I. PROSPEIUTY OF THE PEOPLE.

time, naturally disposes us to magnify and exaggerate
the rapid rate of future improvement. The contem-
plation of so much prosperity, such entire absence of
want and poverty, so many school-houses and
churches, rising every where in the woods, and such a
general desire of education, with the consciousness
that a great continent lies beyond, which has still to
be appropriated, fills the traveller with cheering
thoughts and sanguine hopes. He may be reminded
that there is another side to the picture, that where
the success has been so brilliant and where large
fortunes have been hastily realised, there will be rash
speculations and bitter disappointments ; but these
ideas do not force themselves into the reveries of the
passing stranger. He sees around him the solid
fruits of victory, and forgets that many a soldier in
the foremost ranks has fallen in the breach ; and cold
indeed would be his temperament if he did not
sympathise with the freshness and hopefulness of a
new country, and feel as men past the prime of life
are accustomed to feel when in company with the
young, who are full of health and buoyant spirits,
of faith and confidence in the future.

Aug. 24. — In the suburbs of Kochester, Mr. Hall
and I visited a spot where the remains of the great
Mastodon had been dug up from a bed of white shell-
marl. I found fragments of the fossil teeth and

,i'

i I

W iS:

LAKE ONTARIO. — TORTOISES. Chap. I.

ivory of one tusk, and ascertained that the accom-
panying shells were of recent species of the genera
Limnea, Planorbis, Valvata, C7/clas, &c. We also
examined the narrow ridge composed of sand and
gravel between Rochester and Lake Ontario, which
has been traced for a hundred miles, running nearly
parallel to the lake, and from three to eight miles dis-
tant from it. It rises from ten to twenty feet above
the general level of the surrounding plain of clay, and
presents a steep slope to the north and south, afford-
ing an excellent road, like the sand-ridges or osars
which I have seen in Sweden, and which are doubt-
less of similar origin. Geologists are all agreed that
these and other similar ridges surrounding the great
Canadian lakes, and occurring at different heights
above them, were once lines of beach surrounding
ffreat bodies of water. Whether these consisted of
lakes or seas, — how the water came to stand at so
many different levels, and whether some of the ridges
were not originally banks and bars of sand formed
under water, are points which I shall discuss in the
sequel.

While we were roaming along the shore of Lake
Ontario, to compare the old ridge road with the
modern beach, we saw several tortoises of different
species basking in the sun on logs of drift wood in the
shallow ponds connected with the lake. We caught

Ktg

Chap. I.

TORTOISES.

one of tlicsc {^Tcstado picta), wliich has a gaily
coloured shell, and I afterwards carried it a day's
journey in the carriage, and then turned it out, to see
whether, as I was told, it would know its way back
to Lake Ontario. I am bound to admit that its
instinct on this occasion did not fail, for it made
directly for a ravine, in the bottom of which was a
stream that would lead it in time to the Genesee
River, and this would carry it to its native lake, if it
escaped destruction at the falls below Rochester,
where the celebrated diver, Sam Patch, perished,
after he had succeeded in throwing himself with im-
punity down several other great waterfalls. There
is a freshwater tortoise in Europe ( Terrapcna Eu-
ropea), found in Hungary, Prussia, and Silesia, as far
north as lat. 50° to 52°. It also occurs near Bordeaux,
and in the north of Italy, 44° and 45° N. lat., which
precisely corresponds with the latitude of Lake
Ontario.

In moist places along the lake shore, and in the
lanes and high roads, we saw numerous yellow but-
terflies ( Collas philodice — C. Europoma of some
authors) very like a British species. Sometimes
forty clustering on a small spot resembled a plot of
primroses, and as they rose altogether, and flew off
slowly on every side, it was like the play of a beau-
tiful fountain.

NEW SETTLERS.

Chap. I.

On our way home through the woods we stopped
at the cabin of some new settlers near the lake, many-
miles from any neighbours, in the midst of a square
clearing covered with blackened stumps, where not a
single tree or shrub had been spared. The view was
bounded on every side by a dense wall of dark wood
striped with white by the vertical lines of the numerous
tall and straight trees without side branches, and sup-
porting a dark canojiy of foliage. When we admired
the forest, the settler's wife was pleased, but said,
sighing, that she could not get her children to see any
beauty in trees. They had never known the old
country, nor other friends, and were happier than
she and her husband could be, though in their
worldly concerns they were thriving, and had every
reason to feel content, except when attacked by the
ague, so common in the newly-cleared grounds.

Chap. II.

FALLS OF NIAGARA.

,\v^

1 ■,

CHAPTER II.

Distant and near View of the Falls of Niagairi. — Whether the
Falls have receded from Queenston to their present Site. —
Geographical Features of the liegion. — Course of the River
above and beloiv the Fulls. — Recent Proofs of Frosion. —
Historical Data in the Works of Hennepin and Kalm. — Geo-
logical Evidence derived from Fluviatile Strata or Remnants
of an old River-bed in Goat Island and elsewhere. — Diffi-
culty of computing the Rate of the retrograde Movement. —
Varying Hardness and Thichiess of the Rocks undermined. —
Fidiwe Recession. — Age of the Drift and Limestone Escarp-
ments. — Successive Changes ivhich preceded and accompanied
the Origin of the Falls. — Reflections on the Lapse of jyast
Time.

Aug. 27. — We first came in sight of the Falls of
Niagara when they were about three miles distant.
The sun was shining full upon them — no building in
view — nothing but the green wood, the falling water,
and tlie white foam. At that moment they appeared
to me more beautiful than I had expected, and less
grand ; but after several days, wlien I had enjoyed a
nearer view of the two cataracts, had listened to their
thundering sound, and gazed on them for hours from
above and below, and had watched the river foaming
over the rapids, then plunging headlong into the
dark pool, — and when I had explored the delightful
island which divides the falls, where the solitude of

c 2

FALLS OF NIAGARA :

Chap. II.

the ancient forest is still unbroken, I at last learned
by degrees to comprehend the wonders of the scene,
and to feel its full magnificence.

Early in the morning after our arrival, I saw from
the window of our hotel, on the American side, a
long train of white vapoury clouds hanging over the
deep chasm below the falls. They were slightly
tinted by the rays of the rising sun, and blown slowly
north W"^'«^« ^^y " g entle breeze from thn^jool bolny,
the cataract, which was itself invisible from this point
of view. No fog was rising from the ground, the
sky was clear above ; and as the day advanced, and
the air grew warm, the vapours all disappeared.
This scene reminded me of mv first view of Mount
Etna from Catania, at sunrise in the autumn of 1828,
when I saw dense volumes of steam issuing from the
summit of the highest crater in a clear blue sky,
which, at the height of more than two miles above
the sea, assumed at once the usual shape and hues of
clouds in the upper atmosphere. These, too, va-
nished before noon, as soon as the sun's heat in-
creased.

Etna presents us not merely with an image of the
nower of subterranean heat, but a record also of the
vast period of time during which that power has
been exerted. A majestic mountain has been pro-
duced by volcanic action, yet the time of which the

Chap. II. THEIR GEOGRArillCAL FEATURES.

volcano forms the register, however vast, is found by
the geologist to be cf inconsiderable amount, even in
the modern annals of the cartii's history. In like
manner, the Falls of Niagara teach us not merely to
appreciate the power of moving water, but furnish
us at the same time with data for estimating the
enormous lapse of ages during which that force has
operated. A deep and long ravine has been ex-
cavated, and the river has required ages to accomplish
the task, yet the same region affords evidence that
the sum of these ages is as nothing, and as the work
of yesterday, when compared to the antecedent
periods, of which there are monuments in the same
district.

It has long been a favourite subject of discussion
whether the Falls were once situated seven miles
farther north, or at Queenston. The ideal bird's-
eye view given in the frontispiece may assist the
reader who has not visited the spot to form a
tolerably correct general notion of the geographical
configuration of this country, which is very simjDle.
The view has been constructed from a sketch pub-
lished by Mr. Bakewell, in Loudon's Magazine for
1830, into which the geological representation of
the rocks, as they appear on the surface and in the
ravine of the Niagara, has been introduced from the

c 3

!'»

I'l

1 ij

!' n

COURSE OF THE mvEii

Chap. II,

State Survey by Mr. Hull.* The platform, in a
depression of whieli Lake Eric is situated, is more
than 330 feet above Lake Ontario, and the descent
from a higher to a h)wer level is sudden and abrupt
at the escarpment called the Queenston heights.
The strata throughout this whole region arc nearly
horizontal, but they have a gentle dip to the south
of 25 feet in a mile. This inclination is sufficient
to cause the different groups of rock to crop out one
from beneath the other, or come up to the surface in
parallel zones, which may be traced for a great
distance east and west through the state of Xew
York and Canada. (See Map.) They all consist of
different members of the Silurian series, the upper-
most or newest beinij; those nearest to Lake Erie.
(See section fig. 4., p. 45.) In the bird's-eye view,
the Niagara is seen bounded by low banks where it
issues from Lake Erie, and varying in width from
one to three miles. It here resembles a prolongation
of the tranquil lake, being interspersed with low
wooded islands. This lake-like scenery continues
for about fifteen miles, durino; which the fall of the

* JNIr. BakewcU gave me his original sketches in 1841, and 1
conceived the idea of oombininGj his pictorial view with a ueo-
logical representation of the rocks before I gave a lecture on
the Niagara district at Boston, in October 1841, in which, and
in planning some of the other diagrams, and in discussing the
theory of recession, I was assisted by Mr. Hall.

•.II.

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Chap. II. AIJOVE AND BELOW THE FALL?*.

river scarcely exceeds as many feet, but on reaching
the rapids, it descends over a limestone Ijcd about 50
feet in less than a mile, and is then thrown down about
165 feet perpendicularly at the Falls. The largest of
these, called the Ilorse-shoc Fall, is 1800 feet, or
more than a third of a mile, broad, the island in the
midst somewhat less in width, and the American
Fall about 600 feet wide. The deep narrow chasm
below the great cataract is from 200 to 400 yards
wide, and 300 feet deep; and here in seven miles
the river descends 100 feet, at the end of which it
emerges from the gorge Jnto the open and flat coun-
try, so nearly on a levv^ with Lake Ontario that
there is only a fall of about four feet in the seven
additional miles which intervene between Queenston
and the lake. The great ravine is winding, and
makes a turn nearly at right angles to itself at the
whirlpool, where the Niagara sweeps round a large
circular basin, but it is represented in the frontis-
piece as nearly straight, for the sake of showing the
stratification; and its proportional height is pur-
posely exaggerated. At some points the boundary
cliffs are undermined on one side by the impetuous
stream, but there is usually a tahis at the base of
the precipice, supporting a very ornamental fringe of
trees.

It has long been the popular belief, from a mere

C A

RECENT PROOFS OF EROSION. Chap. II.

cursory inspection of tliis district, that the Niagara
once flowed in a sliiillow valley acro&^j the whole plat-
form from the present site of the Falls to the Queen -
ston heights, where it is supposed the cataract was
first situated, and that the river has been slowly eating
its way backwards through the rocks for a distance
of seven miles. According to this hypothesis, the Falls
must have had originally nearly twice their present
height, and must have been always diminishing in
grandeur from age to age, as they will continue to do
in future so long as the retrograde movement is pro-
longed. It becomes, therefore, a matter of no small
curiosity and interest to inquire at what rate the
work of excavation is now going on, and thus to
obtain a measure for calculating how many thousands
of years or centuries have been required to hollow
out the chasm already excavated.

It is an ascertained fact, that the Falls do not
remain absolutely stationary at the same point of
sjjace, and that they have shifted their position
slightly during the last half century. Every observer
will also be convinced that the small portion of the
great ravine, which has been eroded within the me-
mory of man, is so precisely identical in character
with the whole gorge for seven miles below, that the
river supplies an adequate cause for executing the

r.
•a

Chap. II. RECENT PROOFS OF EROSION.

task assigned to it, provided we grant sufficient time
for its completion.

The waters, after cutting through strata of lime-
stone, about fifty feet thick in the rapids, descend
perpendicularly at the Falls over another mass of
limestone about ninety feet thick, beneath whicli lie
soft shales of equal thickness, continually under-
mined by the action of the spray driven violently by
gusts of wind against the base of the precipice. In
consequence of this disintegration, portions of the
incumbent rock are left unsupported, and tumble
down from time to time, so that the cataract is
made to recede southwards. The sudden descent of
huge rocky fragments of the undermined limestone
at the Horseshoe Fall, in 1828, and another at the
American Fall, in 1818, are said to have shaken tlie
adjacent country like an earthquake. According to
the statement of our guide in 1841, Samuel Hooker,
an indentation of about forty feet has been produced
in the middle of the ledge of limestone at the lesser
fall since the year 1815, so that it has begun to
assume the shape of a crescent, while within the same
period the Horseshoe Fall has been altered so as less
to deserve its name. Goat Island has lost several
acres in area in the last four years, and I have no
doubt that this waste neither is, nor has been, a mere
temporary accident, since I found that the same

c 5

i I

HISTORICAL DATA

Chap. II.

t ':

recession was in progress in various other waterfalls
which I visited with Mr. Hall, in the state of New
York. Some of these intersect the same rocks as the
Niagara — for example the Genesee at Rochester;
others arc cutting their way through newer formations,
as Allan's Creek below Le Roy, or the Genesee at
its upper falls at Portage. Mr. Bakewell calcu-
lated that, in the forty years preceding 1830, the
Niao-ara had been G;oin2: back at the rate of about a
yard annually, but I conceive that one foot per year
would be a much more probable conjecture, in which
case 35,000 years would have been required for the
retreat of the Falls from the escarpment of Queen-
ston to their piesent site, if we could assume that
the rctroi»;rade movement had been uniform throuixh-
out. Tliis, however, could not have been the case, as
at every step in the process of excavation the height
of the preci])icc, the hardness of the materials at its
base, and the quantity of fallen matter to be removed,
must have varied. At some points it may have
receded much faster than at present, at others much
slower, and it would be scarcely possible to decide
whether its average progress has been more or less
rapid than now.

Unfortunately our historical evidence of the former
condition of the cataract is meagre and seamy in the
extreme. Sixty years ago the whole district between

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I !

Chap. II. IN THE WORKS OF HENNEPIN.

Lakes Erie and Ontario was a wilderness in which
the Indian hunter chased the bear and the buffalo.
When at Boston, ray attention was called by Mr.
Ingraham to a work translated from the original
French of Father Hennepin, a missionary who gave
a description of the grand cataract and a plate of it,
as it appeared in the year 1678. It is not wonderful
that coming suddenly upon the Falls, which no Euro-
pean traveller had ever seen before, he should have
believed them to be twice their real height. " Betwixt
the lakes Ontario and Erie," he says, " there is a vast
and prodigious cadence of water, which falls after
an astonishing manner, insomuch that the universe
does not afford its parallel. As to the waters of Italy
and Swedeland, they are but sorry patterns of it,
and this wonderful downfall is compounded of two
great Falls, with an isle in the middle, and there is
another cascade less than the other two which falls
from west to cast. I wished a hundred times that
somebody had been with us, who could have de-
scribed the wonders of this frightful fall. In the
mean time, accept the following draught such as it
is." — From his plate it appears that this third cascade
was produced by what he terms " the elbow " caused
by the projection of the table rock, which must then
have been more prominent than now.

Seventy-three years afterwards, or in 1751, a letter

c G

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1,. |,.j,|,>i' »,om> .HMlllCjl

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i • I \

i;A'-?A-

kalm's description.

Chap. II.

"■a

was published in the Gentleman's ^lagazinc for that
year by Kalm, the Swedish botanist, on the Falls of
Niagara. His description is also illustrated by a
plate, in which the proportional height and breadth of
the Falls are given more correctly. The lesser Fall
on iho left bank of the river is omitted ; but at the
place where it had been represented in Father Henne-
pin's sketch,. Kalm inserts the letter "«," referring to
a note in which he says, " Here the water was for-
merly forced out of its direct course by a projecting
rock, which when standing turned the water off" ob-
liquely across the other Fall."

This observation confirms the reality of Hennepin's
oblique cascade, and shows that some waste had been
going on in the intermediate seventy-three years,
making a visible alteration in the scene, and leading
us to infer that the rocks have been suffering con-
tinual dilapidation for more than the last century and
a half.

In the absence of more ample historical data, we
are fortunately not without geological evidence of the
former existence of a channel of the Niagara at a
much higher level, before the table-land was inter-
sected by the great ravine. Long before my visit to
the Niagara, I had been informed of the existence on
Goat Island of beds of gravel and sand containing
fluviatile shells, and some account had been given of

Chap. II.

UIVER-BED IN GOAT ISLAND.

these by Mr. Hall in his first report in 1839 ; I there-
fore proposed to him that we should examine these
carefully, and see if we could trace any remnants of
the same along the edges of the river-cliffs below the
Falls. We began by collecting in Goat Island shells
of the genera Unio, Cyclas, Melania, Valvata, Lim-
nea, Planorhis, and Helix, all of recent species, in the
superficial deposit. They form regular beds, and nu-
merous individuals of the Urao and Cyclas have both
their valves united. We then found the same form-
ation exactly opposite to the Falls on the top of the

Fig. 1.

Section at Xiagara Falls.

Jj. Limestone 80 feet thick. S. Siinle 80 fort thick.

d. Freshwater strat.i on Goat Island, above 'iO feet thick.

<i'. Same formation on the American side, containing bones of Mastodon.

e. Ledge of bare limestone on the Canada side.
/. Ancient drift.

cliff (at d', fig. 1.) on the American side, where two
river-terraces, one twelve and the other twenty-four
feet above the Niagara, have been cut in the modern
deposits. In these we observed the same fossil shells as
in Goat Island, and learnt that the teeth and other re-
mains of a mastodon, some of which were shown us.

ip!

KEMNANT OF AN OLD RIVER-BED Chap. II.

had been found thirteen feet below the surface
of the soil. We were then taken by our guide
to a spot farther north, where similar gravel and
sand with fluviatile shells occurred near the edge of
the cliff, overhanging the ravine, resting on the solid
limestone. It was about half a mile below the prin-
cipal Fall, and extended at some points 300 yards
inland, but no farther, for it was then bounded by the
bank of more ancient drift (/, fig. 1.). This deposit
precisely occupies the place which the ancient bed
and alluvial plain of the Niagara would naturally
have filled, if the river once extended farther north-
wards, at a level sufficiently high to cover the
greater part of Goat Island. At that period the ravine

North.

-^^E

1) j^—-'^^-^ '"

Si'ctwn of Goat Island from 'North to South, 2500 /cr/ in length.

A. Massive coinpiict portion of the Niagara limestone.

B. Upper tliin-be'dtleil portion ot tlie Niagara limestone, strata slightly inclined to

the South.
c. Horizont il i'reshwiiter beds of gravel, sand, and loam, with shells.
D, E. Present surface of tlie river Niagara at the Ilapids.

could not have existed, and there must have been a
barrier several miles lower down, at or near the
whirlpool.

The supposed original channel, through which the

Chap. II.

IN GOAT ISLAND.

waters flowed from Lake Eric to Quccnston or
Lewiston, was excavated chiefly, but not entirely, in
the superficial drift, and the old river-banks cut in
this drift are still to be seen facing each otlier, on
both sides of the ravine, for many miles below the
Falls. A section of Goat Island from south to north,
or parallel to the course of the Niagara (see
fig. 2.), shows that the limestone (B) had been greatly
denuded before the fluviatile beds (c) were accunni-
lated, and consequently when the Falls were still
several miles below their present site. From this
fact I infer that the slope of the river at the rapids
was principally due to the original shape of the old
channel, and not, as some have conjectured, to modern
erosions on the approach of the Falls to the spot.

The observations made in 1841 induced me in the
following year (June, 1842) to re-examine diligently
both sides of the river from the Falls to Lewiston
and Quccnston, to ascertain if any other patches of
the ancient river-bed had escaped destruction. Ac-
cordinulv, followinG" first the cdo-c of the cliffs on the
eastern bank, I discovered, with no small delight,
at the suinmcr-housc (E, fig. 3.), above the whirl-
pool, a bed of stratified sand and gravel, forty feet
thick, containing fluviatile shells in abundance.
Fortunately, a few yards from the summer-house a
pit had been recently dug for the cellar of a new

ANCIENT FLUVIATILK

Chap. II.

■' »l

^ 11

house to the depth of nine feet in the shelly sand, in
which I found shells of the geneni Unin, Ci/clas,
Melania, Helix, and Pupa, not only identical in
species with those which occur in a fresh state in
the bed of the Niagara, near the ferry, but corrc-

Fig. 3.

Section at the Suinmcr-lwuse above Whirlpool, cast bank of Niagara,

A. Thick-bedilrd limestone, same as at Falls.

b. Ancient drift.

c. Boulders at base of steep bank formed by drift.

d. Fresh-water strata forty feot thick.
E. Summer-house.

sponding also in the proportionate number of indi-
viduals belonging to each species, the valves of Cyclas
simills, for example, being the most numerous. The
same year I found also a remnant of the old river-
bed on the opposite or Canadian side of the river,
about a mile and a half above the whirlpool, or two
miles and a half below the Falls. These facts appear
conclusive as to the former extension of a more

I-

CiiAP. ir.

■DErOSIT WITH SIIKLLS.

elevated valley, four niilcs, at least, below the Falls;
and at this point the old-river bed must have been so
high as to be capable of holding baek the waters
which covered all the }»atches of fluviatile sand and
gravel, including that of Goat Island. As the table-
land or limestone-platform rises gently to the north,
and is highest near Queenston, there is no rtjason
to suppose that there was a greater fall \u the
Niagara when it flowed at its higher ieveb thau n'-.nv
between Lake Erie and the Falls ; anO. aecovding to
this view, the old channti might vvel). lave fiuaishcd
the required barrier.

I have stated that on the left, or Cimatlian hauli of
the Niagara, below the Falls, I succeeded in dctc. tin^
sand with freshwater shells at one point only, near
the mouth of the Muddy Kiver. The ledge of lime-
stone on this side is usually laid bare, or only covered
by vegetable mould (as at e, fig. 1.), uaill we arrive
at the boulder clay (/, £g. 1.), Avhicli is sometiiuOi
within a few yards of the top of the pr?v.ipiec, and
sometimes again retires eighty ynrds or more fi'om it,
being from twenty to fifty feet in heigiit, I also
found an old river-bed runn' ig through the drift
parallel to the Niagara, its course still marked by
swamps and px.nJr, such as we find in all alluvial
plains, and only remarkable here because the river
now runs at a lower level by 300 feet. This de-

III

iKI

' .,1

«]

t 'S

Slij

"s'

RECESSION OF THE

Chap. II.

sertcd channel occurs between the Muddy Kiver and
the Whirlpool, and is 100 yards broad.

There is also a notch or indentation, called the
" Devil's Plole," on the right or eastern side of the
Niagara, half a mile below the Whirlpool, which
deserves notice, for there, I think, there are signs of
the Great Cataract having been once situated. A
small streamlet, called the " Bloody Kun," from a
battle fought there with the Indians, joins the Niagara
at this place, and has hollowed out a lateral chasm.
Ascending the great ravine, we here see, facing us, a
projecting cliff of limestone, which stands out forty
feet beyond the general range of the river cliff below,
and has its flat summit bare and without soil, just as if
it had once formed the eastern side of the Great Fall.

By exploring the banks of the Niagara above the
Falls, I satisfied myself that if the river should
continue to cut back the ravine still farther south-
wards, it would leave here and there, near the verge
of the precipice and on its islands, strata of sand and
loam, with freshwater shells similar to those already
described. I collected fossil shells, for example, on
the left ba?ik, near the Chippewa lliver, and learnt
that others had been reached, in sinking a well, in
1818, at the south-east end of Grand Island. The
situation of such deposits is represented at «, a
(fig. 4., p. 45.).

•«»•

Chap. II.

PALLS or NIAGARA.

low.

The patches of fluviatile strata, therefore, occur-
ing between the old banks of drift (/,/, fig. 1. p. 37.)
and tlie precipice, and not having been met with on
other parts of the platform at a distance from the
Niagara, confirm the theory, previously adopted on
independent evidence, of the recession of the Falls
from Qucenston southwards. The narrowness of the
gorge near Queenston, Avhere it is just large enough
to contain the rajiid current of water, accords well
with the same hypothesis, and there is no ground for
suspecting that the excavation was assisted by an
original rent in the rocks, because there is no fissure
at present in the limestone at the Falls, where the
moving waters alone have power to cut their way
backwards.

I have already remarked that tliere will always be
insuperable difficulties in the way of estimating with
precision the rate of the retrogression of the Falls in
former ages, because at every step ncAV strata have
been successively exposed at the bnse of the precipice.
According to their softer or harder nature, the un-
dermining process must have been accelerated or re-
tarded. This will be understood by reference to the
annexed section (fig. 4.), where the line Z», c, d,
represents the present surface of the river along
which the Falls have receded. The strata (1, 3 and
7), are of soft materials; the others, (2, 4 an i 8),

\i-%

FUTURE RECESSIO^\

Chap. II.

which slightly project at their termination in the
escarpment, are of a more compact and refractory
kind. It has been necessary to exaggerate the
southward dip of tlie strata in this diagram, which is
in reality so slight as to be insensible to the eye,
being only, as before mentioned, about twenty-five
feet in a mile, the river channel sloping in an opposite
direction at the rate of fifteen feet in a mile. These
two inclinations, taken together, have caused, as Mr.
Hall has pointed out in his Survey, a diminution of
forty feet in the perpendicular height of the Falls for
every mile that they receded southward. By reference
to the section, the reader will perceive that when
they were situated at the Whirlpool (c), the quart -
zose sand-stone (2), which is extremely hard, was at
the base of the precipice, and here the Great Cataract
may have remained nearly stationary for ages.

In regard to the future retrocession of the Falls,
it will be perceived by the same section (fig. 4.), that
when they have travelled back two miles, or to z, A,
the massive limestone (8), now at the top of the
Falls, will then be at their base ; and its great hard-
ness may, perhaps, effectually stop the excavating
process, if it should not have been previously arrested
by the descent of large masses of the same rock from
the cliff above. It will also appear that the Falls
will continually diminish in height, and should they

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V '

ORIGIN OF THE FALLS.

Chap. IL

ever reach Lake Erie, they will intersect entirely
different strata from those over which they are now
thrown.

The next inquiry into which we are naturally led
by our retrospect into the past history of this region,
relates to the origin of the Falls. If they were once
seven miles northward of their present site, in what
manner, and at what geological period, did they first
come into existence ? In tracing back the series of
past events, we have already seen that the last change
was the erosion of the great ravine ; previously to
which occurred the deposition of the freshwater
deposit, including fossil shells of recent species, and
the bones of the Mastodon. Thirdly, of still older
date was the drift or boulder formation wliich over-
spreads the whole platform and the face of the
escarpment near Quecnston, as well as the low coun-
try between it and Lake Ontario. Fourthly, the
denudation of the line of cliff or escarpment, in
which the tal)lc-land ends abruptly, preceded the
origin of the drift. I shall endeavour to show, in a
subsc(pient chajiter, when speaking of Canada, that
this drift was of marine origin, and formed when the
whole country was submerged beneath the f^ca. In
the region of the Niagara it is stratified, and though
no fossils have as yet been detected in it, similar
deposits occur in the valley of the fSt. Lawrence at

Chap. II.

ORIGIN OF THE FALLS.

Montreal, at a height nearly equal to Lake Erie,
where fossil shells, of species such as now inhabit the
northern seas, lie buried in the drift.

It is almost superfluous to affirm that a con-
sideration of the geology of the whole basin of the
St. Lawrence and the great lakes can alone entitle
us to speculate on the state of things which im-
mediately preceded or accompanied the origin of the
Great Cataract. To give even a brief sketch of the
various phenomena to which our attention must be
directed, in order to solve this curious problem,
would require a digression of several chapters. At
present the shortest and most intelligible way of
explaining the results of my observations and re-
flections on this subject will be to describe the
successive chaniics in the order in which I imnjiine
them to have happened. The first event then to
which we must recur is the superficial waste or
denudation of the older stratified rocks (from 1 to
10 inclusive, section, fig. 4., p. 45.), all of wliicli
had remained nearly undisturbed and horizontal from
the era of their formation beneath the sea to a
comparatively modern period. That tliey were all of
marine origin is proved by their imbedded corals
and shells. They at length emerged slowly, and
portions of their edges were removed by the action
of the waves and currents, by which clifls were

■ii

ORIGIN OF THE FALLS.

Chap. II.

formed at successive heights, especially where hard
limestones (such as nos. 10 and 8, fig. 4.) at
Blackrock and Lewiston, were incumbent on soft
shales. After this denudation the whole region was
again gradually submerged, and this event took place
during the glacial period, at which time the surfaces
of the rocks already denuded were smoothed, polished,
and furrowed by glacial action, which operated suc-
cessively at different levels. The country was then
buried under a load of stratified and unstratified
sand, gravel, and erratic blocks, occasionally 80, and
in some hollows more than 300, feet deep. An old
ravine terminating at St. David's, which intersects
the limestone platform of the Niagara, and opens
into the great escarpment, illustrates the posteriority
of this drift to the epoch when the older rocks were
denuded. The period of submergence last alluded
to was verv modern, for the shells then inhabiting;
the ocean belonged, almost without exception, to
species still living in high northern, and some of
them in temperate, latitudes. The next great change
■was the re-emergence of this country, consisting of
the ancient denuded rocks, covered indiscriminately
with modern marine drift. The upward movement
by which this was accomplished was not sudden and
instantaneous, but gradual and intermittent. The
pauses by which it was Interrupted are marked by

i 1

Chap. II.

ORIGIN OF THE FALLS.

ancient beach-lines, ridges, and terraces, found at
different heights above the present lakes. These
ridges and terraces are partly due to the denudation
and re-arrangement of the materials of the drift
itself, which had previously been deposited on the
platform, the sloping face of the escarpments, and in
the basins of the great lakes.

As soon as the table-land between Lakes Erie
and Ontario emerged and was laid dry, the river
Niagara came into existence, the basin of Lake
Ontario still continuing to form part of the sea.
From that moment tliere was a cascade at Quecnston
of moderate height, which fell directly into the sea.
The uppermost limestone and subjacent slate (8 and
7, fig. 4. p. 45.) being exposed, the cataract com-
menced its retrograde course, while the lower beds
in the escarpment (from 6 to 1) were still protected
from waste by remaining submerged. A second
fall would in due time be caused by the continued
rise of the land and the exposure of the hard beds
(6 and 4), constituting what is called the Clinton
group, together with the soft and easily undermined
red shale (3), on which they repose. Finally, a third
cascade would in all likelihood be produced by the
rise of another hard mass, the quartzose sandstone
(2, fig. 4.) resting on very destructible red shale
(1). Three falls, one above the other, very similar

j.i I

REFLECTIONS ON THE

Chap. II.

n !

' >l

in their geological and geographical position to those
actually seen on the river Genesee at Rochester,
would thus be formed. The recession of the upper-
most must have been gradually retarded by the
thickening of the incumbent limestone (No. 8, fig. 4),
in proportion as the Falls sawed their way southwards.
By this means the second cataract, which would
not suffer the same retardation, might overtake it,
and the two united would then be retarded by the
large quantity of rock to be removed, until the
lowest fall would come up to them, and then the
whole v/ould be united into one.

The principal events enmnerated in the above
retrospect, comprising the submergence and re-emer-
gence of the Canadian lake district and valley of the
St. LaAvrence, the deposition of freshwater strata,
and the gradual erosion of a ravine seven miles long,
are all so modern in the earth's history as to belong
to a period when the marine, the fluviatile, and
terrestrial shells, were the same, or nearly the same,
as those now livinjiij. Yet if we fix our thouirhts
on any one portion of this period — on the lapse
of time, for cxami)lc, required for the recession of
the Niagara from the escarpment to the Falls,—
how immeasurably great will its duration appear
in comparison with the sum of years to which the
annals of the human race are limited ! Had we

Chap. II.

LAPSE OF PAST TIME.

happened to discover strata, charged with fluviatile
shells of recent species, and enclosing the bones and
teeth of a Mastodon, near a river at the bottom of
some valley, we might naturally have inferred that
the buried quadruped had perished at an era long
after the canoes of the Indian hunter had navigated
the North American waters. Such an inference
might easily have been drawn respecting the fossil
tusk of the great elephantine quadruped, which I
saw taken out of the shell-marl on the banks of the
Genesee River near Rochester (sec p. 23.). But
fortunately on the Niagara, we may turn to the
deep ravine, and behold therein a chronometer
measuring rudely, yet emphatically, the vast magni-
tude of the interval of years, which separate the
present time from the epoch when the Niagara
flowed at a higher level several miles further north
across the platform. We then become conscious
how far the two events before confounded together,
— the entombment of the Mastodon, and the date of
the first peopling of the earth by man, — may recede
to distances almost indefinitely remote from each
other.

But, however much we may enlarge our ideas of
the time which has elapsed since the Niagara first
began to drain the waters of the upper lakes, we have
seen that this period was one only of a series, all be-

D 2

I i

.«^

REFLECTIONS ON THE

Chap. II.

(■

longing to the present zoological epoch ; or that in
which the living testaceous fauna, whether freshwater
or marine, had already come into being. If such
events can take place while the zoology of the earth
remains almost stationary and unaltered, what ages
may not be comprehended in those successive tertiary
periods during which the Flora and Fauna of the
globe have been almost entirely changed. Yet how
subordinate a place in the long calendar of geological
chronology do the successive tertiary periods them-
selves occupy ! How much more enormous a dura-
tion must we assign to many antecedent revolutions
of the earth and its inhabitants I No analogy can be
found in the natural world to the immense scale of
these divisions of past time, unless we contemplate
the celestial spaces which have been measured by
the astronomer. Some of the nearest of these within
the limits of the solar system, as, for example, the
orbits of the planets, are reckoned by hundreds of
millions of miles, which the imagination in vain en-
deavours to grasp. Yet one of these spaces, such as
the diameter of the earth's orbit, is regarded as a
mere unit, a mere infinitesimal fraction of the dis-
tance which separates our sun from the nearest star.
By pursuing still farther the same investigations, we
learn that there are luminous clouds, scarcely dis-
tinguishable l>y the naked eye, but resolvable })y the

Chap. II.

LAPSE OF PAST TIME.

telescope into clusters of stars, which arc so much
more remote, that the interval between our sun and
Sirius may be but a fraction of this larger distance.
To regions of space of this higher order in point of
magnitude, we may probably compare such an inter-
val of time as that which divides the human epoch
from the origin of the coralline limestone over which
the Niagara is precipitated at the Falls. Many have
been the successive revolutions in organic life, and
many the vicissitudes in the physical geography of
the globe, and often has sea been converted into land,
and land into sea, since that rock was formed. The
Alps, the Pyrenees, the Himalaya, have not only be-
gun to exist as lofty mountain chains, but the solid
materials of which they are composed have been
slowly elaborated beneath the sea within the stu-
pendous interval of ages here alluded to.

The geologist may muse and speculate on these
events until, filled with awe and admiration, he for-
gets the presence of the mighty cataract itself, and
no longer sees the rapid motion of its waters, nor
hears their sound, as they fall into the deep abyss.
But whenever his thoughts arc recalled to the pre-
sent, the tone of his mind, — the sensations awakened in
his soul, will be found to be in perfect harmony with
the grandeur and beauty of the glorious scene which
surrounds him.

«i*

s 3

.1^

TOUR TO PENNSYLVANIA.

CiiAr. nr.

'\ I

CHAPTER HI.

Tour from the Niagnrn to the Northern Frontier of Pennsylvania.
— Ancient Gypsiferous Formation of New York. — Fossil
Mastodon at Geneseo. — Scenery. — Sudden Growth of New
Totvns. — Coal of Blossherg, and resemblance to British Coal
Measures. — Stigmaria. — Humming Birds. — Nomenclature
of Places. — Helderherg Mountains and Fossils. — Refractory
Tenants. — Travelling in the States. — Politeness to Women. —
Canal-hout. — Domestic Service. — Progress of Civilisation. —
Philadelphia. — Fire-engines.

Sept. 2. 1841. — FiiOM Niagara Falls wc travelled to
the large town of Buffalo, on the shores of Lake
Erie, and then passed through Williamsville, Le Roy,
and Geneseo, in the State of New York. The hori-
zontal Silurian rocks of this region nro in general
extremely like those of corresponding age in Europe,
consisting of mud-stones and limestone, with similar
corals and shells. But there is one remarkable ex-
ception; — the occurrence in the middle of the series
of a formation of red, green, and bluish grey marls
w^ith beds of gypsum, and occasional salt-springs, the
whole being from 800 to 1,000 feet thick, and undis-
tinguishable in mineral character from |)arts of the
Upper New Ked or Trias of Europe. Near Le Roy
I saw these marls and the gypsum exposed to view in
quarries. In the overlying limestone at Williams-
ville were large masses of corals, of the genera

Chap. III. FOSSIL MASTODON AT GENESEO.

FavositcSf C)/sti])h?/lluni, and others, in the position in
which they grew. Some of the species agree with
British fossils, but the greater part of them, as I may
state on the authority of Mr. Lonsdale, who has
studied my specimens, are distinct.

When at the village of Genesco, I learnt that ten
years before, the bones of a Mastodon had been ob-
tained from a bog in the neighbourhood, and I was
desirous of knowing whether any shells accompanied
the bones, and whether they were of recent species.
Mr. Hall and I therefore procured workmen, who were
soon joined by several amateurs of Genesco, and a pit
was dug to the depth of about five feet from the sur-
face. Here we came down upon a bed of white shell-
marl and sand, in which lay portions of the skull,
ivory tusk, and vertebra;, of the extinct quadruped.
The shells proved to be all of existing freshwater and
land species now common in this district. I had
been told that the Mastodon's teeth were taken out of
muck, or the black superficial peaty earth of this bog.
I was therefore glad to ascertain that it was really
buried in the shell-marl below the peat, and therefore
agreed in situation with the large fossil elks of Ire-
land, which, though often said to occur in peat, are
in fact met with in subjacent beds of marl.

At the Falls of Le Eoy, and at the Upper Falls of
the River Genesee at Portage, I had opportunities of

D 4

«)"

..- m^.m.-' ■ i mt if irmt^^m'^mtmmmmm

AMERICAN DRIVERS.

Chap. III.

*>.

¥ f '

h; ':

ti:f

observiiific how both of these cascades have been cut-
ting their way backwards through the Silurian rocks,
even within the memory of the present settlers.
They have each hollowed out a deep ravine with
perpendicular sides, bearing the same proportion in
volume to the body of water flowing through them
which tlie great ravine of the Niagara does to that
river.

Mr. Hall took leave of us at Geneseo, after which
I set out on a tour to examine the series of rocks be-
tween the upper Silurian strata of the State of New
York and the Coal of Pennsylvania. With this view
I took ihc direction of Blossberg, where the most
nortliern coal mines of the United States arc worked.

On this occasion we loft the main road, and en-
tered, for the first time, an American stage-coach,
having been warned not to raise our expectations too
high in regard to the ease or speed of our conveyance.
Accordingly, we found that after much fatigue, we
had only accomplished a journey of 46 miles in
12 hours, between Geneseo and Dansville. We had
four horses ; and wlien I complained at one of the
inns that our coachman seemed to take pleasure in
driving rapidly v^ver deep ruts and the roughest
ground, it was explained to me that this was tlie first
time in his life he had ever attempted to drive any
vehicle, whether two or four-wheeled. The coolness

*- -

IV:

Chap. III.

WANT OF FINE SCENERY.

and confidence with which every one here is ready to
try his hand at any craft is truly amusing. A few
days afterwards I engaged a young man to drive nie
in a gig from Tioga to Blossberg. On the way, lie
pointed out, first, his father's property, and then a
farm of his own, which ho had lately purchased. As
he was not yet twenty years of age, I expressed sur-
prise that he had got on so well in the world, when
he told me that he had been editor of the " Tioga
Democrat " for several years, but had now sold his
share of the newspaper.

In the region between Lake Erie and the borders
of Pennsylvania, as Avell as in that immediately south
of Lake Ontario, there is an entire want of fine
scenery, as might have been anticipated where all the
strata are horizontal. The monotony of the endless
forest Is sometimes relieved by a steep escarpment, a
river with wooded islands, or a lake ; but the only
striking features in the landscape are the waterfalls,
and the deep chasms hollowed out by them in the
course of ages. As the opposite banks of these
ravines are on the same level, including that of the
Niagara itself, we come abruptly to their edges before
we have any suspicion of their existence, and we must
travel out of our way to enjoy a sight of them.

At length we reached the water-shed, where the
streams flow, on tlie one side,, northwards to Lfikc

D 5

'i\

HW!

FOSSIL REMAINS OF FISH.

Chap. III.

Ill

Erie, and on the other, southwards, to the Susque-
hanna. I began to wonder how the Indians ever
obtained any correct notions of topography in so con-
tinuous a forest, all the smaller rivers, with their
islands, being embowered and choked up with trees.
I soon ceased to repine at the havoc that was going
on in tlio fine timber which bounded our road on
every side.

After traversing successive zones of the Upper
Silurian strata, I at length entered at Bath upon the
olive-coloured slates and grey sandstone, which seem
to be the equivalent of the low^er part of the Old
Ked, or Devonian of England. In this rock some
streaks of carljonaceous matter, which soon thin out,
and are rarely three inches thick, are met with. I
found a proprietor on Spalding's Creek preparing to
sink a costly shaft for coal, and I earnestly dissuaded
him from his project, referring him to the New York
survey. Every scientific man who discourages a
favourite mining scheme must make up liis mind to
be as ill received as the physician who gives an honest
opinion that his patient's disorder is incurable.

After the Olive Slate, I came to an inciunbcnt
formation of red sandstone near Tioga, and collected
fish of two species of Jlolopfic/iius, one ai)parently
identical with //. nobiUsslmus, a fossil of the ]]ritish
Old Red, and another which, I learn from Sir Philip

Chap. III. SUDDEN GIIOWTII OF NEW TOWNS. 59

Egerton, belongs to an entirely new type of this
genus. With these were a species of Chelonicthys
of large dimensions, a form also very characteristic
of the same formation both in Russia and Scotland.

Sept. 5. — At Bath I hired a private carriage for
Corning. Although there are two railways here
with locomotive engines, one leading to the south,
the other for conveying the coal of Blossberg to the
Erie canal, I looked in vain for tlie name of Corning
in a newly-published map, and was informed that tlie
town was only two years old. xVlrcady the school-
liouse was finished, the spire of the IVIetliodlst church
nearly complete, the Presbyterian one in the course
of building, the site of the Episcopalian decided on.
Wishing to have a carriage, I was taken to a Lu'ge
livery stable, where there were several vehicles and
good horses. The stumps of trees, some six feet
high, are still standing in the gardens and between
the houses. Our innkeeper remarked that tlie cost
of uprooting them would be nearly equal to that of
erecting a log-house on the same place. I auuised
myself by counting the rings of annual growth in
these trees, and found that some hiid been only forty
years old when cut down, yet when these began to
grow, no white man liad ap[)roachcd within many
leagues of this \ alley; most of the older stumps
went back no farther than two centuries, or to the

D 8

I '

111

.■^:^yy:-

l7l

SOCIAL EQUALITY.

Chap. III.

landing of the pilgrim fathers, some few to the time
of Sir Walter Raleigh, and scarcely one to the days
of Columbus. I had before remarked that very
ancient trees seemed uncommon in the aboriginal
forests of this part of America. They are usually
tall and straight, with no grass growing under their
dark shade, although the green herbage soon springs
up when the wood is removed and the sun's rays
allowed to penetrate. Some of the stumps, espe-
cially those of the fir tribe, take fifty years to rot
away, though exposed in the air to alternations of
rain and sunshine, a fact on Avhich every geologist
will do well to reflect, for it is clear that the trees of
a forest submerged beneath the waters, or still more,
if entirely excluded from air, by becoming imbedded
in sediment, may endure for centuries without decay,
so tliat there may have been ample time for the slow
petrifaction of erect fossil trees in the Carboniferous
and otlier formations, or for the slow accunmlation
around them of a great succession of strata.

I asked the landlord of the inn at Cornino;, who
was very attentive to his guests, to find my coach-
man. He imuiediatelv called out in his bar-room,
" Wliere is the cfentleman that brought this man
here ? " A few days before, a farmer in Xew York
had styled my wife '^ the woman," though he called
his own daughters ladies, and would, I believe, have

Chap. III.

COAL or BLOSSBEKG.

freely extended that title to their maid-servant. I
was told of a witness in a late trial at Boston, who
stated in evidence that " while he and another gentle-
man were shovelling up mud," &c. ; from which it
appears that the spirit of social equality has left no
other signification to the terms " gentleman " and
" lady " but that of " male and female individual."

Sept. 7. Blossberg,— I had now entered Pennsyl-
vania, and reached one of the extreme north-eastern
outliers of the great Appalachian coal-field, as Pro-
fessor Rogers has termed the Coal-measures of Penn-
sylvania, Ohio, and Virginia. It was the first time
I had seen the true " Coal " in America, and I was
much struck with its surprising analogy in mineral
and fossil characters to that of Europe — the same
white grits or sandstones as are used for building
near Edinburgh and Newcastle — similar black shales,
often bituminous, with the leaves of ferns spread out
as in an herbarium, the species being for the most
part identical with British fossil plants — seams of
good bituminous coal, some a few inches, others
several yards in thickness — beds and nodules of
clav iron-stone ; and the whole series resting on a
coarse grit and conglc^nerate, containing quartz
pebbles, very like our Millstone Grit, and often called
by the American as well as tlie English miners the
*' Farewell Hock," because when they have reached

ill

%■>■■

!!'l

STIGMAKIA.

Chap. HI.

01
I)

;,'

f'l

it in their borings, they take leave of all valuable
fuel. Betieath this grit are those red and grey
sandstones already alluded to as corresponding in
mineral character, fossils, and position, with our " Old
Red."

I was desirous of ascertain) ns; whether a general-
isation recently made by Mr. Logan in South
Wales could hold good in this country. E-ich of
the Welsh seams of coal, more than ninety in
number, have been found to rest on a sandy clay
or fircstone, in which a pecidiar species of plant
called Stlgmaria abounds, to the exclusion of all
others. I saw tlie Sti(jmaria at Blossbcrg, lying in
abundance in the heaps of rubbish where coal had
been extracted from a horizontal scam. Dr. Say-
nisch, president of the mine, kindly lighted up the
gallery that I might inspect the works, and we saw
the black shales in the roof, adorned with beautiful
fern leaves, while the floor consisted of an undcr-
clay, in which the stems of Stigniaria, witli their
leaves or rootlets attached, were running in all
directions. The agreement of these phenomena with
those of the Welsh Coal-measures, 3000 miles dis-
tant, surprised me, and lead to conclusions respecting
the origin of coal from plants not drifted, but growing
on the spot, to which I shall refer in tlie se(picl.

Dr. Saynisch, who was the first to explore the

lA' -

Chap. III.

HUMMING-BIRDS.

Old

coal in this region, told me that, soon after he
settled here, he shot a wolf out of his bedroom
window. These animals still commit havock on the
flocks, and last autumn a large panther was killed
in the outskirts of Blossberg, but the bears have
not been seen for several years. We rode in a hot
sunny day to a large clearing in the forest far from
any habitation, and I was struck with the perfect
silence of the surrounding woods. We heard no
call or note of any bird, nothing to remind us of
the chirping of the chaffinch or autumnal song of
our robin, the grasshoppers and crickets alone
keeping up a ceaseless din day and night. The
birds here are very abundant, and some are adorned
with brilliant plumage, as the large woodpecker,
with its crimson head, — the yellow-bird (^Frhi<jilla
tristin), of the size of a yellow-hammer, witli black
wings and a bright yellow body, — the red-bird
( Tamujra ruhva)^ — and the Lnxia ludovislana.

A hen humming-bird, far less brilliant in its
plumage than the male, flew within a few inches
of my face. Its flight and diminutive size reminded
me of our humming sphinx, or hawk-moth, like
which it remains puised in the air while sucking
the flowers, the body seeming motionless, and the
wings being invisible from the swiftness of tlicir
vibrations. I had before seen one in the wood at

I
'I

TAMENESS OF WILD ANIMALS.

Chap. III.

I;l

Cedarville, sucking the flower of a wild balsam
(^Impatiens hijiorn). Dr. Saynisch tells me that on
his first visit to these woods, he has known two of
these birds at a time perch on the edge of a cup of
water which he held in his hand, and drink without
fear. I was aware from Mr. Darwin's Voyage in
the Bctu/le, that in islands like the Galai)agos,
" AVhorc biiman foot hath ne'er or rarely been,"
the wild birds have no apprehension of danger from
man; but here, where for ages the Indian hunters
preceded the whites, I am surprised to learn that an
instinctive dread of the great " usurper " had not
become hereditary in the feathered tribe. I was told,
however, that in the hunting grounds called Indian
Reservations, within the limits of the settled and
civilised states, of which we passed one in New
York, the wild animals are comparatively tame, it
being a system of the Indians never to molest the
game or their prey, except when required for food.

We returned from Blossberg by tlie town of
Jefferson, and, sailing down Seneca Lake in a steam-
boat to Geneva, joined the railway, which carried
us back again to Albany. At one of the stations
where the train stopped we overlieard some young
women from Ohio exclaim, " Well, we are in a
pretty fix!" and found their dilemma to be charac-
teristic of tlie financial crisis of these times, for

Chap. III. NOMENCLATURE OF PLACES.

none of their dollar notes of the Ohio banks would
pass here. The substantive " fix " is an acknow-
ledged vulgarism, but the verb is used in New
England by well educated people, in the sense of the
French " arranger " or the English " do." To fix
the hair, the table, the fire, means to dress the hair,
lay the table, and make up the fire ; and this aj)pli-
cation is, I presume, of Hibernian origin, as an Irish
gentleman. King Corney, in Miss Edgeworth's tale
of Orniond, says, " I'll fix him and his wounds."

There are scarcely any Americjtn idioms or words
which are not of British origin, some obsolete, others
provincial. When the lexicographer, Noah Webster,
whom I saw at Newhavcn, was asked how many
new words he had coined, he replied one only " to
demoralize," and that not for his dictionary, but
long ])efore, in a pamphlet published in the last
century.

The nomenclature of the places passed through
in oiu* short excursion of one month was strange
enough. We had been at Syracuse, Utica, Rome,
and Parma, had gone from Buffalo to Batavia, and
on the same day breakfasted at St. Helena, and
dined at Elba. We collected fossils at Moscow, and
travelled by Painted Post and Big Flats to Havanna.
After returning by Auburn to Albany T was taken
to Troy, a city of 20,000 inhabitants, that I might

'ill

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'hi

j:
V

NOMENCLATURE OF PLACES. Chap. IIL

see a curious landslip which had just liappened on
Mount Olympus, the western side of that hill,
together with a contiguous portion of Mount Ida,
having slid down into the Hudson, and caused the
death of several persons. Fortunately, some few
of the Indian names, such as Mohawk, Ontario,
Oneida, Canandaigua, and Niagara, arc retained.
Although legislative interference in behalf of good
taste would not be justifiable, Congress might inter-
pose for the sake of the post-office, and prevent the
future multiplication of the same names for villages,
cities, counties, and townships. That more than a
hundred places should be called Washington is an
intolerable nuisance. An Englishman, it is true,
cannot complain, for we follow the same system in
our colonies ; and it is high time that the post-mastf ?•-
general brought in a bill for prohibiting new streets
in London from receiving names already appropriated
and repeated fifty times in that same city, to the
infinite confusion of the inhabitants and their letter-
carriers.

At Troy I visited Professor Eaton, who published
in 1824, in his " Survey of the Erie Canal," the
earliest account of the Niagara district, dividing the
rocks into groups, nearly all of which have been
since adopted by the New York surveyors. The
mind of this pioneer in American geology was still

V ^*.

Chap. III.

nELDEllBERG MOUNTAINS.

in full activity, and his zeal unabated; but a few
months after my visit he died at an advanced age.

I next examined, in company with Mr. Hall, two
swamps, situated in Albany and Greene counties,
west of the Hudson river, where the remains of a
Mastodon occurred, in both places at the depth of
four or five feet, in shell-marl, with recent species of
shells. These deposits of mnrl covered with i)eat are
newer than the boulder formation, and cattle have
very lately been mired in the same bogs. In similar
situations in Scotland and England we find only the
remains of existing mammalia ; and although on the
banks of the Thames and elsewhere we discover the
bones of the extinct elephant and rhinoceros as-
sociated with recent land and freshwater shells (min-
gled, howevei", with some few exotic species), the
strata in which they lie do not belong precisely, like
those in New York, to the most modern geographical
condition of the country.

We then made a tour to the Ilelderberg Moun-
tains, S. W. of Albany, to see the Upper Silurian
strata and to study their fossils in the museum of Mr.
Gebhard at Schoharie. The depth of the valleys,
and some precipitous cliffs of limestone, render this
region more picturesque than is usual where the
strata are undisturbed. I rejoiced to see the sugar-
maple {Acer saccharinus), an ornamental tree, spared

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REFRACTORY TENANTS.

Chap. III.

> I

I t

in the new clearings. Tlie sap from wliich sugar is

made was everywhere trickling clown into wooden

troughs from gashes made in the bark. The red

maples were now beginning to assume their bright

autumnal tints, but the rest of the forest was as

verdant as ever; a blue Lobelia, which we had

gathered at the Falls of Niagara, was still in bloom,

together with many white and blue asters which had

only just come out. The most elegant flower in the

woods at this season is the fringed gentian ( Gentiana

crinitd).

" Bright with Autumn dew,

And colour'd with the Heaven's own blue."

One day at Schoharie, a hawk pounced down from
a lofty tree, and seized a stri[)ed squirrel on the
ground, witliin three yards of our party. It was
bearing oiF its burden with ease, until, alarmed by
our shouts, it dropped the squirrel, which ran off
apparently unhurt. I observed early in the morning
myriads of cobwebs extending from one blade of grass
to another, as we often see them on an English lawn
before the dew is dried up.

On our way back from Schoharie to Albany, we
found the country pcoi)le in a ferment, a sheriff's
officer having been seriously wounded when in the
act of distraining for rent, this being the third year
of the " Helderberg war," or a successful resistance

Chap. III.

REFRACTORY TENANTS.

by an armed tenantry to the legal demands of their
landlord, Mr. Van Renssalaer. It appears that a
large amount of territory on both sides of the river
Hudson, now supporting, according to some es-
timates, a population of 100,000 souls, had long been
held in fee by the Van lienssalaer family, the
tenants paying a small ground rent. This system
of things is regarded by many as not only in-
jurious, because it imposes grievous restraints upon
alienation, but as unconstitutional, or contrary to the
genius of their political institutions, and tending
to create a sort of feudal perpetuity. Some of the
leases have already been turned into fees, but many
of the tenants were unable or unwilling to pay
the prices asked for such conveyances, and de-
clared that they had paid rent long enough, and
that it was high time that they should be owners of
the land.

A few years ago, when the estates descended from
the late General Van Renssalaer to his sons, the
attempt to enforce the landlord's rights met with
open opposition. The courts of law gave judgment,
and the sheriff of Albany having failed to execute
his process, at length took military force in 1839,
but with no better success. The governor of New
York was then compelled to back him with the mili-
tary array of the state, about 700 men, who began

J I .

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. 1

11 M

I i J

i'
\ Si

I &^

TRAVELLING IN THE STATES. Chap. III.

the campaign at a clay's notice in a severe snow
storm. The tenants are said to have mustered
against them 1500 strong, and the rents were still
unpaid, when in the following year, 1840, the
governor, courting popularity as it should seem, while
condemning the recusants in his message, virtually
encouraged them by reconunending their case to the
favourable consideration of the state, hinting at the
same time at legif<lative remedies. The legislature,
however, to their credit, refused to enact these,
leaving the case to the ordinary courts of law.

The whole affair is curious, as demonstrating the
impossibility of creating at present in this country a
class of landed proprietors deriving their income from
the letting of lands npon lease. Every man must
occupy his own acres. lie who has capital enough
to stock a farm can obtain land of his own so cheap
as naturally to prefer being his own landlord.

Sept. 27. 1841. — We embarked once more on the
Hudson, to sail from Albany to New York, with
several hundred passengers on board, and thought
the scenery more beautiful than ever. The steam-
boat is a great floating hotel, of which the captain is
landlord. He presides at meals, taking care that no
gentlemen take their places at table till all the ladies,
or, as we should say in England, the women of every
class, are first seated. The men, by whom they arc

;£;i

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Chap. III.

POLITENESS TO WOMEN.

accompanied, are then invited to join them, after
which, at the sound of a bell, the bachelors and mar-
ried men travelling en gari;on pour into the saloon, in
much the same style as members of the House of
Commons rush into the Upper House to hear a speech
from the throne.

One of the first peculiarities that must strike a
foreigner in tlie United States is the deference paid
universally to the sex, without regard to station.
Women may travel alone here in stage-coaches,
steam-boats, and railways, with less risk of encounter-
ing disagreeable behaviour, and of hearing coarse and
unpleasant conversation, than in any country I have
ever visited. The contrast in this respect between the
Americans and the French is quite remarkable. There
is a spirit of true gallantry in all this, but the pub-
licity of the railway car, where all are in one long
room, and of the large ordinaries, whether on land or
water, is a great protection, the want of which has
been felt by many a female traveller without escort
in England. As the Americans address no conver-
sation to strangers, we soon became tolerably recon-
ciled to living so much in public. Our fellow-
passengers consisted for the most part of shopkeepers,
artizans, and mechanics, with their families, all well-
dressed, and so far as we had intercourse with them,
polite and desirous to please. A large part of them

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if:

If!

ii::!.

CANAL-BOAT.

Chap. III.

I-

were on pleasure excursions, in which tliey delight
to spend their spare cash.

On one or two occasions during our late tour in
the newly-settled districts of New York, it was inti-
mated to us that we were expected to sit down to
dinner with our driver, usually the son or brother of
the farmer who owned our vehicle. We were in-
variably struck with the propriety of their manners,
in which there was self-respect without forwardness.
The only disagreeable adventure in the way of coming
into close contact with low and coarse companions,
arose from my taking places in a cheap canal-boat
near Lockport, partly filled with emigrants, and
correspond )i.>/^ somewhat in the rank of its passen-
gers with X third-class railway-carriage in England.
" Que diable allait-il faire dans cettc galore ? "
would have been a difficult question for me to answer,
especially as I afterwards learnt that I might have
hired a good private carriage at the very place where
I embarked. This convenience indeed, although
there is no posting, I invariably found at my com-
mand in all the states of the Union, both northern
and southern, which I visited during my t^tay in
America.

Travellers must make up their minds, in this as in
other countries, to fall in now and then with fi-ee and
easy people. I am bound, however, to say that in

Chap. III. PROGRESS OF CIVILIZATION.

the two most glaring instances of vulgar familiarity
wiiich we have experienced here, we found out that
both the offenders had crossed the Athmtic only ten
years before, and had risen rapidly from a humble
station. Whatever good breeding exists here in the
middle classes is certainly not of foreign importation ;
and John Bull, in particular, when out of humour
with the manners of the Americans, is often uncon-
sciously beholding his own image in the mirror, or
comparing one class of society in the United States
with another in his own country, which ought, from
superior afliuence and leisure, to exhibit a higher
standard of refinement and intelligence.

We have now seen the two largest cities, many
towns and villages, besides some of the back settle-
ments of New York and the Xcw England States ; an
exemplification, I am told, of a population amounting
to about five millions of souls. We have met with
no beggars, witnessed no signs of want, but every-
where the most unequivocal proofs of prosperity and
rapid progress in agriculture, commerce, and great
public works. As these states are, some of them, en-
tirely free from debt, and the rest have punctually
paid the interest of Government loans, it would be
most unjust to apply to them the disparaging com-
ment " that it is easy to go ahead with borrowed
money." In spite of the constant influx of uneducated

ill

I 11

1 \

if,

IB t,
■n

■

ruor.uEss of civilization. Chap, hi.

anl pcnnylcss adventurers from Europe, I believe it
would be impossible to find five millions in any other
region of the globe whose average moral, social,
and intellectual condition stands so high. One con-
vincing evidence of their well-being has not, I think,
been sufficiently dwelt upon by foreigners : I allude
to the difficulty of obtaining and retaining young
American men and women for a series of years in
domestic service, an occupation by no means con-
sidered as degrading here, for they are highly paid,
and treated almost as equals. But so long as they
enjoy such facilities of bettering their condition, and
can marry early, they will naturally renounce this
bondage as soon as possible. That the few, or the
opulent class, especially those resident in country
places, should be put to great inconvenience by this
circumstance, is unavoidable, and we must therefore
be on our guard, when endeavouring to estimate the
happiness of the many, not to sympathise too much
with this minority.

I am also aware that the blessing alluded to, and
many others which they enjoy, belong to a pro-
gressive, as contrasted with a stationary, state of
society ; — that they characterize the new colony,
where there is abundance of unoccui)ied hmd, and
a ready outlet to a redundant labouring class.
They are not the results of a democratic, as

III.

ClIAI'. III.

rillLADELnilA.

, and
pro-
it e of
olony,
1, and
clasa.
ic, as

compared with a monarchical or aristocratic con-
stitution, nor the fruits of an absohitc equality
of religious sects, still less of universal suffrage.
Nevertheless, we must not forget how easily all
the geographical advantages arising from climate,
soil, fine navigable rivers, splendid harbours, and a
wilderness in the far West, might have been marred
by other laws, and other political institutions. Had
Spain colonized this region, how different would
have been her career of civilisation I Had tlie
puritan fathers landed on the banks of the Plata,
how many hundreds of large steamers would ere
this have been i)lying the Parana and Uruguay, —
how many railway- trains flying over the Pampas,
— how many large schools and universities flourishing
in Paraguay!

Sept. 28. — We next went by railway from New
York to Philadelphia through the state of New
Jersey. Large fields of maize, without the stumps
of trees rising above the corn, and villas with neat
flower-gardens, seemed a novelty to us after the eye
had dwelt for so many hundreds of miles on native
forests and new clearings. The streets of Phila-
delphia rival the finest Dutch towns in cleanliness,
and the beautiful avenues of various kinds of trees
afford a most welcome shade in summer. We were
five days here, and every night there was an alarm

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FIIIE-KNOINES.

Chap. IH.

)!i

, I

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rih

of fire, usually a false one ; but the noise of the fire-
men was tremendous. At the head of the procession
eamc a runner blowing a horn with a deep unearthly
sound, next a long team of men (for no horses are
employed) drawing a strong rope to which the pon-
derous engine was attached with a larjje bell at the
top, ringing all the way ; next followed a mob, some
with torches, others shouting loudly ; and before they
were half out of hearing, another engine follows with
a like escort ; the whole afliiir resembling a scene in
Do' Frcischutz or Robert le Diahlf, rather than an
act in real life. It is, however, no sham, for these
young men are ready to risk their lives in extin-
guishing a fire ; and as an apology for their disturbing
the peace of the city when there was no cause, wo
were told " that the youth here require excitement!"
They manage these matters as effectively at Boston
without turmoil.

Chap. IV. EXCUUSION TO NEW JERSEY.

CHAPTER IV.

Excursion to New Jersey. — Cretaceous rocks compared to
European. — General analogy of fossils, and distinctness of
species. — Toiir to the Anthracite region of the Alleghanies in
Penusylvania. — Long parallel ridges and valleys of these
mountains. — Pottsvdle. — Absence of smoke. — Fossil phmts
same as in bituminous coal. — Stigmariee. — Great thickness of
strata. — Origin of Anthracite. — Vast area of the Appalachian
coal-field. — Progressive debituminization of coal from icest to
east. — General remarks on the different groups of rocks beticeen
the Atlantic and the Mississippi. — Law of structure of the
Appalachian chain discovered by the Professors Pogers. —
Increased folding and dislocation of strata on the south-eastern
flank of the Appalachians. — Theory of the origin of this
mountain chain.

Cretaceous Strata of New Jersey.

Sept. 30. 1841.— From Philadelphia I made a geo-
logical excursion of several days, to examine the
cretaceous strata of New Jersey, in company with
Mr. Conrad, to whom we are indebted for several va-
luable works on the fossil shells of the tertiary, cre-
taceous, and Sihirian strata of the United States.
We went first to Bristol on the Delaware to visit Mr.
Vanuxcm, then engaged in preparing for publication
his portion of the State Survey of New York ; next by
Bordentown to New Egypt, and returned by the
Timber Creek, recrossing the Delaware at Camden.

E 3

I 'I

4'
I-

1' '

\l I

I' i

cki:tacec)i s strata

ClIAi'. IV.

Altliouy:h in this i)art of Now .Icrscv there id no
white chalk witli Hints, so cliarjicteristic of rocks of
this a^e in Europe, it is still impossible to glance at
the fossils, ami not to be convinced that Dr. IMorton
was right in referring in 1834 the New Jersey de-
])osits to the European cretaceous era. He and ]Mr.
Conrad remtirked that the American species of shells
were nearly all new, or distinct from those before de-
scribed, and yet very analogous to those of cretaceous
strata already known. The New Jersey rocks have
been separated into five subdivisions, but of these
two only have proved sufficiently rich in organic
remains to admit of their Ijeing compared with corre-
sponding strata in distant regions. The lower of these
consists in great part of green sand and green marl,
and was supposed by Dr. Morton to be tlio equivalent
of the English " Green sand ;" while an upper or cal-
careous rock, composed chiefiy of a soft straw-coloured
limestone with corals, was thought to correspond with
the white chalk of Europe. But after carefully com-
paring my collection, comprising about 60 species of
shells, besides many corals and other remains, I have
arrived at the conclusion that the whole of the New
Jersey series agrees in its chronological relations with
the European white chalk, or, to speak more precisely,
with the formations ranginfj; from the Gault to the
Maestricht beds inclusive. Among the shells, in de-

Chap. IV.

OV NEW .TERSKY.

•9

tcrmining which 1 have been assisted by Professor
E. Forbes, not more than four out of sixty seem to
be quite identical with European species. Tlicsc are
Belemnitcs mucronatuSi Pectcn (juiufjuccostainSf Osfrai
falcata ( O. larva, Goldfuss), and O. vcsicularis. Seve-
ral others , however, approach very near to, and may
be the same as European shells, as for example Tri-
ffonia thoracica, and at least fifteen may be regarded
as good geographical representatives of well-known
chalk fossils, belonging, for the most part, to beds
above the Gault in Europe. There are a few very
peculiar forms among the American testacea, such as
Tcrchratula Sayii (Morton).

In the upper or straw-coloured limestone, I found,
on the banks of the Timber Creek, twelve miles south-
east of Philadelphia, six species of corals and several
echinoderms, chieHy allied to Upper Cretaceous forms.
The same calcareous stratum also abounds in forami-
nifera, characteristic of the chalk, comprising, among
others, the genera Cristcllaria, Rotalina, and Nodo-
saria. Mr. Owen has recognised, in the fossil reptiles
from New Jersey, not only the vertebra) of Mosasau-
rus, previously noticed by Dr. Morton, but also the
Pliosaurus, and a large crocodile of the Prococlian di-
vision, or having its vertebra like the living species,
with the anterior surface concave. There are also
many fish of the shark family, analogous to those of

E 4

GENERAL ANALOGY OF FOSSILS. Chap. IV.

K i

the English chalk, and the Galciis pristodontus is
represented by a species very closely allied, if not
identical.

Upon the whole, the list of genera, and the forms
of the species, are remarkably analogous to tie creta-
ceous group of Europe ; and the agreement of four
or five species of Mollusca, being in the proportion of
about seven in the hundred, implies no inconsiderable
amount of affinity at a distance of between 3000 and
4000 miles from the corresponding assemblage of
fossils in Central and Northern Europe, especially
when we recollect that there is a difference in latitude
of more than ten degrees between the two districts
compared. Some of the species common to the op-
posite sides of the Atlantic, are those which in Europe
have the greatest vertical range, as Pccten quinquecos-
tatus, and which might therefore be expected to recur
in distant parts of the globe.

At the same time we learn from the facts above
mentioned, that the marine fiiuna, whether vertebrate
or invertebrate, testaceous or zoophytic, was divided
at the remote epoch under consideration, as it is now,
into distinct geographical provinces, although the
geologist may everywhere recognise the cretaceous
type, Avhether in Europe or America, and I might
add, India. This peculiar type exhibits the prepon-
derating influence of a vast combination of circum-

Chap. IV. TOUR TO THE ANTIIUACITE REGION. 81

Stances, prevailing at one period throughout the
globe — circumstances dependent on the state of the
physical geography, climate, and the organic world
in the period immediately preceding, together with a
variety of other conditions too long to enumerate
here. It would not be difficult for a naturalist to
point out the characters stamped on the living Flora
and Fauna, by which they also might be distinguished
as a whole from those of all former geological epochs.
The resemblance of the corals, shells, and insects, of
certain temperate regions of the southern hemisphere
(Van Dieman's Land, for example), to those of the
temperate zone north of the equator, or the close
analogy of the arctic and antarctic fauna, the species
in both cases being quite different, are illustrations of
the common type here alluded to, which is evidently
caused or controlled by some general law, and by some
mutual relation existing between the animate creation
and the state of the habitable surface at any given
period.

Anthracite Formation of Pennsylvania.

OctSd. — Having already seen the carboniferous
strata at Blossberg in Pennsylvania, where they are
very slightly disturbed, and where the coal is bitumi-
nous, I was desirous of examining some of the great
mines of anthracite coal which occur in tlie midst of

s 5

1 ii

THE ALLEGHANY MOUNTAINS. Chap. IV.

the most bent and inclined strata of the Alleghany
mountains. Professor H. D. Rogers, who, with an
able corps of assistants, had now nearly brought to a
close his elaborate State Survey of Pennsylvania,
kindly offered to be my guide, which enabled me in
a comparatively short time to obtain an insight into
the seolojxical structure of this chain. We first fol-
lowed the course of the Schuylkill River, passing
through a country moderately elevated (b, c, fig. 5.
p. 92.), with hills between 200 and 300 feet above the
sea, where the i*o(5ks consisted chiefly of gneiss. As
we went westward we entered a belt, about twenty-
five miles broad, of red sandstone and trap (New
Red), similar to that before mentioned at Newhaven.
Having traversed these granitic and secondary form-
ations, Ave arrived at Reading, fifty-two miles N. W.
of Philadel2)hia, and were then at the base of the
easternmost of the great parallel ridges which con-
stitute the AUeghanics or Appalachian chain of
mountains. The rocks of this chain consist of the
Silurian, Devonian, and Carboniferous groups, which
are folded as if they had been subjected to a g"cat
lateral pressure when in a soft and yielding state,
large portions having been afterwards removed by
denudation. No traveller can fail to remark the lono-
and uniform parallel ridges, with intervening valleys,
like so many gigantic wrinkles and furrows, which
mark the geographical outline of this region; and

Chap. IV.

POTTSVILLE.

these external features are found by the geologist to
be intimately connected Avith the internal arrange-
ment of the stratified rocks. The long and narrow
ridges, rarely rising more than 2000 feet above the
valleys, and usually not more than half that height,
are broken here and there by transverse fissures,
which give passage to rivers, and by one of which
the Schuylkill flows out at Reading. The strata arc
most disturbed on the south-eastern flank of the
mountain chain, where we first entered, and they
become less and less broken and inclined as they
extend westward.

After passing several belts of the inferior fossili-
ferous strata, we came to the Anthracite coal-measures
of Pottsville on the Schuylkill. Here I was agreeably
surprised to see a flourishing manufacturing town
with the tall chimneys of a hundred furnaces, burning
night and day, yet quite free from smoke. Leaving
this clear atmosphere, and going down into one of the
mines, it was a no less pleasing novelty to find that
we could handle the coal without soiling our fingers.
The slow combustion of anthracite can be overcome
by a strong current of air, not only in large furnaces,
but by aid of a blower in the fire-places of private
dwellings, and its drying effect on the air of a room
may be counteracted by the evaporation of water.
As managed by the Americans, I have no hesitation in

£ 6

// '

STIGMARIiE.

Chap. IV.

fei

*■

t I

preferring its use, in spite of the occasional stove-like
heat produced by it, to that of bituminous coal in
London, coupled with the penalty of living constantly
in a dark atmosphere of smoke, which destroys our
furniture, dress, and gardens, blackens our public
buildings, and renders cleanliness impossible.

In the neighbourhood of Pottsville, there are no less
than thirteen seams of anthracite coal, several of which
are more than two yards thick. Some of the lowest
of these alternate with white grits and a conglomerate
of coarser texture than I had ever seen in any pro-
ductive coal-measures, some of the pebbles of quartz
being of the size of a hen's egg. I was curious to
know whether the Stigmariae would be found here in
the underclays, as at Blossberg before-mentioned,
situated 120 miles to the westward. It was easy to
ascertain the fact, for several of the coal scams, from
eight to ten feet thick, were quarried in the open air,
and the strata being vertical, a void space was left,
after the removal of the fuel, like a straight open
fissure, in which we could walk, and see, in the wall
on the one side, a stratum originally above, and on
the other, that which had been immediately below the
coal. On the former, or what is usually termed the
roof, were shales with distinct impressions of ferns ;
among others, the British species Pecoptcris lonchitica
and Neuroptcris cordata, together with trunks and

,1 ■(

IV.

Chap. IV.

VAST SEAM OF ANTHRACITE.

stems of Sigillaria, Lepidodenclron, and Calamites ;
while on the opposite or south-eastern side, was an
iinderclay with numerous Stigmariae, often several
yards, and even in some cases thirty feet long, with
their leaves or rootlets attached.

In this coal field, as in all the others hitherto
observed in America, particular seams of coal are
found to be far more persistent than the accompany-
ing beds of shale, sandstone, or limestone. As we
proceeded from Pottsville, by Tamaqua, to the
Lehigh Summit Mine, we found the beds of grit and
4iale gradually to thin out, so that several beds of
anthracite, at first widely separated, were brought
nearer and nearer together, until they united, and
formed one mass about fifty feet thick, without any
greater interpolated matter than two thin layers of
clay with Stigmaria?. At Mauch Chunk, or the
Bear INIountain, this remarkable bed of anthracite is
quarried in the open air, and removed bodily to-
gether with the overlying sandstone, forty feet thick,
the summit of the hill being " scalped," as one of the
miners expressed it. The vegetable matter, which
is represented by this enormous mass of ant^iracite,
must, before it was condensed by pressure and the
discharge of its hydrogen, oxygen, and other volatile
ingredients, have been probably between 200 and
300 feet thick. The accumulation of such a thick-

'»!

fit

■■. i

i' f

u ■

GREAT THICKNESS OF STRATA Chap. IV.

ness of the remains of plants, so unmixed with earthy-
ingredients, would be most difficult to explain on
the hypothesis of their having been drifted into the
place they now occupy ; but it becomes intelligible
if we suppose them to have grown on the spot.
Whether we regard the Stigmaria? as roots, according
to the opinion of M. Adolphe Brongniart and Mr.
Binney, or embrace the doctrine of their being
aquatic plants, no one can doubt that they at least
are fossilised on the very spot where they grew ; and
as all agree that they are not marine plants, they
go far to establish the doctrine of the growth hi situ.
of the materials of the overlying coal seams.

The prodigious thickness of the carboniferous rocks
in this part of the Appalachian chain, is in harmony
with the theory already alluded to, which requires
the repeated sinking down of many successive ter-
restrial surfaces, allowing an indefinite quantity of
sediment to be superimposed vertically in one con-
tinuous series of beds. The surveys of Pennsylvania
and Virginia show that the south-east was the
quarter whence the coarser materials of the carboni-
ferous rocks were derived, and there are proofs that
the ancient land lay in that direction. The con-
glomerate which forms the general base of the coal
measures is 1500 feet thick in the Sharp Mountain,
where I saw it, near Pottsville ; whereas it has only

J i

IV.

Chap. IV.

IN THE ALLEGUANIES.

a thickness of 500 feet, about thirty miles to the
north-west, and dwindles gradually away when fol-
lowed still farther in the same direction, till its
thickness is reduced to thirty feet. {Rogers. Trans.
Assoc. Amer. Geol, 1840-42, p. 440.) The lime-
stones, on the other hand, of the coal measures,
augment as we trace them westward. Similar ob-
servations have been made in regard to the Silurian
and Devonian formations in New York; the sand-
stones and all the mechanically-formed rocks thinning
out as they go westward, and the limestones thick-
ening, as it were, at their expense. It is, therefore,
clear that the ancient land was to the east ; the deep
sea, Avith its banks of coral and shells, to the west.

I at first supposed that some deception might
have arisen respecting the alleged thickness of the
older fossiliferous rocks of the Appalachians, owing
to the dislocations and inverted position of the beds,
but I was soon convinced that due regard had been
paid to the apparent repetitions caused by these
disturbances, and I have little doubt that those
Silurian and Devonian strata, which do not exceed
in their aggregate thickness a mile and a half in the
State of New York, acquire more than three times
that thickness in the Pennsylvanian Alleghanies.

A few days' observation of the identity of the fossil
plants, and the relative position of the anthracite,

I'i

■li'i

VAST EXTENT OF

Chap. IV.

t .1

Iff i"; ■ ji I

satisfied me that it was of the same age as the
bituminous coal which I had seen at Blossberg.
This opinion was, I believe, first promulgated by-
Mr. Featherstonehaugh in 1831, at a time when
many geologists were disposed to assign a higher an-
tiquity to the anthracite than to the bituminous
coal measures of the United States. The recent
surveys have now established this fact ^beyond all
question, and hence it becomes a subject of great
interest to inquire how these two kinds of fuel,
originating as they did from precisely the same
species of plants, and formed at the same period,
should have become so very different in their che-
mical composition. In the first place, I may mention
that the anthracitic coal-measures above alluded to,
occurring in the eastern or most disturbed part of
the Appalachian chain, are fragments or outliers of
the great continuous coal field of Pennsylvania, Vir-
ginia, and Ohio, which occurs about forty miles to
the westward. This coal field is remarkable for its
vast area, for it is described by Professor 11. D.
Rogers as extending continuously from N.E. to S. AY.,
for a distance of 720 miles, its greatest width being
about 180 miles. On a moderate estimate, its su-
perficial area amounts to 63,000 square miles. It
extends from the northern border of Pennsylvania as
far south as near Huntsvillc in Alabama.

Chap. IV.

Chap. IV. THE APPALACHIAN COAL FIELD.

age as the

Blossberg.

nulgated by

time when
% higher an-

bituminous

The recent
; ^beyond all
ect of great
nds of fuel,
y the same
same period,
n their che-
may mention
) alluded to,
rbed part of
r outliers of
>^lvania, Vir-
)rty miles to
kable for its
Pessor 11. D.
r.E. to S.AV.,

width being
mate, its su-
e miles. It
msylvania as
I.

This coal formation, before its original limits were
reduced by denudation, must have measured, at a
reasonable calculation, 900 miles in length, and in
some places more than 200 miles in breadth. By re-
ference to the section (fig. 5., p. 92.), it will be seen that
the strata of coal are horizontal to the westward of the
mountain in the region D, E, and become more and
more inclined and folded as we proceed eastward.
Now it is invariably found, as Professor H. D. Rogers
has shown by chemical analysis, that the coal is
most bituminous towards its western limit, where it
remains level and unbroken, and that it becomes pro-
gressively debituminizcd as we travel south-eastward
towards the more bent and distorted rocks. Thus,
on the Ohio, the proportion of hydrogen, oxygen,
and other volatile matters, ranges from forty to fifty
per cent. Eastward of this line, on the Mononga-
hela, it still approaches forty per cent., where the
strata begin to experience some gentle flexures. On
entering the Alleghany Mountains, where the distinct
anticlinal axes begin to show themselves, but before
the dislocations are considerable, the volatile matter
is generally in the proportion of eighteen or twenty
per cent. At length, when we arrive at some in-
sulated coal fields (5', fig. 5.) associated with the
boldest flexures of the Api)alachian chain, where the
strata have been actually turned over, as near Potts-

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iMMHVMWM!!

DEBITUMINIZATION OF COAL. Chap. IV.

^ .1

ville, wc find the coal to contain only from six to
twelve per cent, of bitumen, thus becoming a genuine
anthracite. {Trans, of Ass. of Amer. Geol, p. 470.)

It appears from the researches of Liebig and
other eminent chemists, that when wood and vege-
table matter are buried in the earth, exposed to
moisture, and partially or entirely excluded from
the air, they decompose slowly and evolve carbonic
acid gas, thus parting with a portion of their original
oxygen. By this means, they become gradually
converted into lignite or wood-coal, which contains
a larger proportion of hydrogen than wood does.
A continuance of decomposition changes this lignite
into common or bituminous coal, chiefly by the dis-
charge of carburetted hydrogen, or the gas by which
we illuminate our streets and houses. According
to Bischoif, the inflammable gases which are always
escaping from mineral coal, and are so often the
cause of fatal accidents in mines, always contain
carbonic acid, carburetted hydrogen, nitrogen, and
olifiant gas. The disengagement of all these gra-
dually transforms ordinary or bituminous coal into
anthracite, to which the various names of splint
coal, glance coal, culm, and many others, have been
given.

We have seen that, in the Appalachian coal field,
there is an intimate connection between the extent

Chap. IV.

THE APPALACHIAN CHAIN.

to which the coal has parted with its gaseous con-
tents, and the amount of disturbance which the
strata have undergone. The coincidence of these
phenomena may be attributed partly to the greater
facility afforded for the escape of volatile matter,
where the fracturing of the rocks had produced
an infinite number of cracks and crevices, and also
to the heat of the gases and water penetrating these
cracks, when the great movements took place, which
have rent and folded the Appalachian strata. It is well
known that, at the present period, thermal waters
and hot vapours burst out from the earth during
earthquakes, and these would not fail to promote
the disengagement of volatile matter from the car-
boniferous rocks.

! .il

I I

Structure and Origin of the Appalachian

Chain.

The subjects discussed in the preceding pages,
' lead me naturally to say something respecting the
structure of the Appalachian chain, and its geological
relations to the less elevated regions east and west
of it. The annexed ideal section (fig. 5.), to which
I shall have frequently occasion to refer in the
sequel, will give some notion of the principal phe-
nomena, omitting a great number of details. Starting

GEOLOGICAL SECTION.

CUAP. IV.

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Chap. IV.

THE APPALACHIAN CHAIN.

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from the shores of tlic Athintic, on tho eastern fiide
of the Conthicnt, we first come to a low region (a, n),
which was called the alluvial plain by lUt first geogra-
phers. It is occupied by tertiary and cretaceous strata
nearly horizontal, and containing in general no hard
and solid rocks, and is usually not more than
from 50 to 100 feet high, in Pennsylvania and
Virginia. In these states this zone is not many
leagues in breadth, but it acquires a breadth of 100
and 150 miles in the Southern States, and a height
of several hundred feet town •d'« its western limits.
The next belt, from b to C, consists of granitic
rocks (hypogcne), chiefly gneiss and mica-schist,
covered occasionally with unconformable red sand-
stone, No. 4 (New Red ?), remarkable for its ornithic-
nites. Sometimes also this sandstone rests on the
edges of the disturbed paleozoic rocks (as seen in
the Section). The region (b, c), sometimes called the
" Atlantic Slope," corresponds nearly in average width
with the low and flat plain (a, b), and is characterised
by hills of moderate height, contrasting strongly, in
their rounded shape and altitude, with the long,
steep, and lofty parallel ridges of the Alleghany
mountains. The out-crop of the strata in these
ridges, like the two belts of hypogcne and newer
rocks (a,b, and b,c), above alluded to, when laid
down on a geological map, exhibit long stripes of

t t

} X

'II :i

! .:!

STRUCTURE AND ORIGIN OF Chap. IV.

different colours, running in a N. E. and S. W.
direction, in the same way as the lias, chalk, and
other secondary formations in the middle and eastern
half of England.

The narrow and parallel zones of the Appalachians
here mentioned consist of strata, folded into a suc-
cession of convex and concave flexures, subsequently-
laid open by denudation. The component rocks are
of great thickness, all " referable to the Silurian,
Devonian, and Carboniferous formations. There is
no principal or central axis, as in the Pyrenees and
many other chains — no nucleus to which all the
minor ridges conform ; but the chain consists of many
nearly equal and parallel foldings, having what the
geologists term an anticlinal and synclinal arrange-
ment. This system of hills extends, geologically con-
sidered, from Vermont to Alabama, being more than
1000 miles lonr, from 50 to 150 miles broad, and
varying in height from 2000 to 6000 feet. Sometimes
the whole assemblage of ridges runs perfectly straight
for a distance of more than 50 miles, after which
all of them wheel round together, and take a new
direction, at an angle of 20 or 30 degrees to the
first.

Mr. R. C. Taylor had made considerable progress
in unrnvelling the structure of certain portions of
this chain, before the commencement of the State

Chap. IV. THE APPALACHIAN CHAIN.

Surveys of Virginia and Pennsylvania, the former
conducted by Professor W. B. Rogers, the latter by
his brother. Professor H. D. Rogers, both aided by
a numerous corps of assistants. To these elaborate
and faithful surveys we owe the discovery of the clue
to the general law of structure prevailing throughout
this important range of mountains, which, however
simple it may appear when once made out and
clearly explained, might long have been overlooked,
amidst so great a mass of comjilicated details. It
appears that the bending and fracture of the beds is
greatest on the south-eastern or Atlantic side of the
chain, and the strata become less and less disturbed
as we go westward, until at length they regain their
original or horizontal position. By reference to the
section (fig. 5.), it will be seen that on the eastern side,
or on the ridges and troughs nearest the Atlantic,
the south-eastern dips predominate, in consequence
of the beds having been folded back upon them-
selves, as in ?, those on the north-western side of
each arch having been inverted. The next set of
arches (such as h) are more open, each having its
western side steepest: the next (I) opens out still
more widely, the next (ni) still more, and this con-
tinues until we arrive at the low and level part of
the Appalachian coal field (d, e).

In nature, or in a true section, the number of

!. \l

■I At.'M '"> iiBWi II

111! ,|

STRUCTURE AND ORIGIN OF Chap. IV.

:4 W

. ■ !j

I •

bendings or parallel folds is so much greater that
they could not be expressed in a diagram without
confusion. It is also clear that large quantities of
rock have been removed by aqueous action or de-
nudation, as will appear if we attempt to complete
all the curves in the manner indicated by the dotted
lines at i and k.

The movements which imparted so uniform an
order of arrangement to this vast system of rocks
must have been contemporaneous, or belonging to
one and the same series, depending on some commoL
cause. Their geological date is unusually well
defined. We may declare them to have taken place
after the deposition of the carboniferous strata
(Xo. 5.), and before the formation of the red sand-
stone (No. 4.). The greatest disturbing and de-
nuding forces have evidently been exerted on the
south-eastern side of the chain, and it is here that
igneous or plutonic rocks are observed to have
invaded the strata, forming dikes, some of which run
for miles in lines parallel to the main direction of the
Appalachians, or N.N.E and S.S.W.

According to the theory of the Professors llogers,
the wave-like flexures, above alluded to, are ex-
plained by supposing the strata, when in a j)lastic
state, to have rested on a widely-extended surface of
fluid lava, and elastic vapours and gases. The

Chap. IV.

THE APPALACHIAN CHAIN.

billowy movement of this subterranean sea of melted
matter imparted its undulations to the elastic over-
lying crust, which was enabled to retain the new
shapes thus given to it by the consolidation of the
liquid matter injected into fissures.*

For my own part, I cannot imagine any real con-
nection between the great parallel undulations of the
rocks and the real waves of a subjacent ocean of
liquid matter, on which the bent and broken crust
may once have rested. That there were great lakes
or seas of lava, retained by volcanic heat for ages, in
a liquid state, beneath the Alleghanies, is highly
probable, for the simultaneous eruptions of distant
vents in the Andes leave no doubt of the wide sub-
terranean areas permanently occupied by sheets of
fluid lava in our own times. It is also consistent
with what we know of the laws governing volcanic
action to assume that the force operated in a linear
direction, for we see trains of volcanic vents break-
ing out for hundreds of miles along a straight
line, and we behold long parallel fissures, often filled
with trap or consolidated lava, holding a straight
course for great distances through rocks of all ages.
The causes of this peculiar mode of development are
as yet obsciu'e and unexplained ; but the existence of
long narrow ranges of mountains, and of great fjuilts

* Trans, of Ass. of Ainer. Geol. 1840-2, p. 515

STRUCTURE AND ORIGIN OF Chap. IV.

and vertical shifts in the strata proh)nged for great
distances in certain directions, may all be results of
the same kind of action. It also accords well with
established facts to assume that the solid crust
overlying a region where the subterranean heat is
increasing in intensity, becomes gradually upheaved,
fractured, and distended, the lower part of the newly
opened fissures becoming filled with fused matter,
which soon consolidates and crystallizes. These
uplifting movements may be propagated along narrow
belts, placed side by side, and may have been in
progress simultaneously, or in succession, in one
narrow zone after another.

When the expansive force has been locally in
operation for a long period, in a given district, there
is a tendency in the subterranean heat to diminisli ;
— the volcanic energy is spent, and its position is
transferred to some new region. Subsidence then
begins, in consequence of the cooling and shrinking
of suljterranean seas of lava and gaseous matter : and
the solid strata collapse in obedience to gravity. If
this contraction take place along narrow and parallel
zones of country, the incumbent flexible strata would
be forced, in proportion as they were let down, to pack
themselves into a smaller space, as they conformed
to the circumference of a smaller arc. Tlie manner
in which undulations may be gradually produced in

Chap. IV.

THE ArrALACIIIAN CHAIN.

and
If
•allel
'ould
pack
'nied

pliant strata by subsidence is illustrated on a small
scale by the creeps in coal-mines ; there both the
overlying and underlying shales and clays sink down
from the ceiling, or rise up i'rom the floor, and fill
the galleries which have been left vacant by the
abstraction of the fuel.* In like manner the failure
of support arising from subterranean causes may
enable the force of gravity, though originally exerted
vertically, to bend and squeeze the rocks as if they
had been subjected to lateral pressure.

" Earthquakes have rais'd to heaven the humble vale,
And gulplis the mountain's mighty mass entomb'd,
And whei'e th' Atlantic rolls, wide continents have bloom'd."

In applying these lines to the physical revolutions
of the territory at present under consideration, we
must remember that the continent which bloomed
to the eastward, or where the Atlantic now rolls its
waves (see p. 87.), was anterior to the origin of the
carboniferous strata Avhich were derived from its
ruins ; whereas the elevation and subsidence supposed
to have given rise to the Appalachian ridges was sub-
sequent to the deposition of the coal-measures. But
all these 2^reat movements of oscillation were ac:ain
distinct from the last upheaval which brought up the
whole region above the level of the sea, laying dry

* See "Elements of Geology," by the author.
vol. i. p. 110.

t 2

2d ed.

t!l. .„

>^!

<«

i'.*

■'^ f 1

100

THE APPALACHIAN CHAIN.

Chap. IV.

the horizontal New Red Sandstone (No. 4. fig. 5.), as
well as a great part of, if not all, the Appalachian
chain.

The largest amount of denudation is found, as
might have been expected, on the south-eastern side
of the chain, where the force of expansion and con-
traction, of elevation and subsidence, has been
greatest. The first set of denuding operations may
have taken place when the strata, including the car-
boniferous, were first raised above the sea ; a second,
when they sank again ; a third, when the Red Sand-
stone (No. 4.), after it had been thrown down on the
truncated edges of the older strata, participated in
the waste. The great extent of solid materials thus
removed, must add, in no small degree, to the diflfi-
culty of restoring in imagination the successive
changes which have occurred, and of accounting in a
satisfactory manner for the origin of this mountain
chain.

Chap.v. wooded ridges of allegiianies. 101

CHAPTER V.

Wooded ridges of the Alleghany Mountains German patois in

Pennsylvania. — Lehigh summit Mine. — Effects of ice during
a flood on the Delaicare. — Election of a governor at Trenton
and at Philadelphia. — Journey to Boston. — Autumnal tints of
the foliage. — Boston the seat of commerce, of government, and of
a university. — Lectures at the Lowell Institute. — Influence of
oral instruction in literature and science. — Fees of public lec-
turers. — Educational funds sunk in costly buildings. — Ad-
vantages of anti-building clauses. — Blind Asylum. — Lowell
Factories. — National schools. — Equality of sects. — Society in
Boston.

October 7. 1841. — TiiE steep slopes, as well as the
summits of the ridges in the anthracite region of
Pennsylvania, are so densely covered with wood, that
the surveyors were obliged to climb to the tops of
trees, in order to obtain general views of the country,
and construct a geographical map on the scale of two
inches to a mile, on which they laid down the result
of their geological observations. Under the trees,
the ground is covered with the Rhododendron, Kalmia
and another evergreen called Sweet Fern ( Comptonia
'^fplenifoUa), the leaves of which have a very
agreeable odour, resembling that of our bog-myrtle
{Myrica Gale), but fainter. The leaves are so like

? 3

102

LEIIIGII SUMMIT MINE.

Chap. V.

I I

: *

i? i

ifi:

■' !

»:!'

those of a fern or Pterls in form, tliat the miners call
the impressions of the fossil Pecopteris, in the coal-
shales " sweet-fern."

We found tlie German language chiefly spoken in
this mountainous region, and preached in most of the
churches, as at Reading. It is fast degenerating
into a patois, and it is amusing to see many Ger-
manized English words introduced even into the
newspapers, such as turnpelk for turnpike, y^w^c for
^id\\QQ,Jlu(icr for flour, or others, such as jail, which
have been adopted without alteration.

From the Lehigh Summit Mine, we descended for
nine miles on a railway impelled by our own weight,
in a small car, at the rate of twenty miles an hour.
A. man sat in front checking our speed by a drag on
the steeper declivities, and oiling tlic Avlicels without
stopping. The coal is let down by the same railroad,
sixty mules being employed to draw up the empty
curs every day. In the evening the mules themselves
arc sent down standing four abreast, and feeding
out of mangers the whole way. AYe saw them start
in a long train of waggons, and were told, that so
completely do they acquire the notion that it is their
business through life to pull weights up hill, and ride
down at their ease, that if any of them are afterwards
taken away from the mine and set to other occupa-
tions, they willingly drag heavy loads up steep as-

Chap. V. EFFECTS OF ICE DURING A FLOOD.

103

cents, but obstinately refuse to pull any vehicle down
hill, coming to a dead halt at the commencement of
the slightest slope.

The general effect of the long unbroken summits
of the ridges of the Alleghany Mountains is very
monotonous and unpicturesque : but the scenery is
beautiful, where we meet occasionally with a trans-
verse gorge through which a large river escapes.
After visiting the Beaver Meadow coal field, we left
the mountains b^ one of these openings, called the
Lehigh Gap, wooded on both sides, and almost filled
up by the Lehigh Kiver, a branch of the Delaware,
the banks of which we now followed to Trenton in

New Jersey.

On our way, we heard much of a disastrous flood

which occurred Inst spring on the melting of the
snow, and swept away several bridges, causing the
loss of many lives. I observed the trees on the right
bank of the Delaware at an elevation of about twenty-
four feet above the present surface of the river, with
their bark worn through by the sheets of ice which
had been driven against them. The canal was en-
tirely filled up with gravel and large stones to the
level of the towing path, twenty feet above the pre-
sent level of the stream, which appeared to me to be
only explicable by supposing the stones to have been
frozen into and carried by the floating ice.

F 4

I )

104

ELECTION OF GOVERNORS.

Chap. V.

■.' J

Oct. 11. — Reaching Trenton, the capital of New
Jersey, late in the evening, we found the town in all
the bustle of a general election. A new governor and
representatives for the State legislature were to be
chosen. As parties are nearly balanced, and the
suffrage universal, the good order maintained was
highly creditable. Processions, called "parades,"
were perambulating the streets headed by bands of
music, and carrying transparencies with lights in
them, in which the names of different counties, and
mottoes, such as Union, Liberty, and Equality, were
conspicuously inscribed. Occasionally a man called
out with a stentorian voice, " The ticket, the whole
ticket, and nothing but the ticket," which was fol-
lowed by a loud English hurra, while at interv.als a
single blow was struck on a great drum, as if to
imitate the firing of a gun. On their tickets were
printed the names of the governor, officers, and mem-
bers for whom the committee of each party had de-
termined to vote.

The next day on our return to Philadelphia, we
found that city also in the ferment of an election,
bands of music being placed in open carriages, each
drawn by four horses, and each horse decorated with
a flag, attached to its shoulder, which has a gay effect.
All day a great bell tolls at the State house, to re-
mind the electors of their duties. It sounded like a
funeral ; and on my inquiring of a bystander what it

Chap. V.

JOURNEY TO BOSTON.

105

meant, one of the democratic party answered, " It is
tlie knell of the whigs." In their popidar addresses,
some candidates ask the people whether they will
vote for the whigs who will lay on new taxes. As it
is well known, that such taxes must be imposed, if
the dividends on the State bonds are to be paid,
these popular appeals are ominous. The rapid fall in
the value of State securities shows that the public
generally have no confidence that the majority of the
electors will be proof against the insidious arts of
these demagogues.

Oct. 14. — We came from Philadelphia by New
York to Boston, 300 miles, without fatigue in twenty-
four hours, by rail way and steam-boat, having spent
three hours in an hotel at New York, and sleeping
soundly for six hours in the cabin of a commodious
steam-ship as we passed through Long Island Sound,
The economy of time in travelling here is truly ad-
mirable. On getting out of the cars in the morning,
we were ushered into a spacious saloon, where with
200 others we sat down to breakfast, and learnt witli
surprise, that, while thus agreeably employed, we had
been carried rapidly in a large ferry-boat without
perceiving any motion across a broad estuary to Pro-
vidence in the State of Rhode Island.

Many trees in New Jersey, Connecticut, and
Massachusetts, have now begun to assume their

F 5

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BOSTON.

CUAP. \.

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autumnal tints, especially the maples, while the
oaks retain their vivid green colour. I can only
compare the brightness of the faded leaves, scarlet,
purple, and yellow, to that of tulips. It is now the
Indian sunnner, a season of warm sunny weather,
which often succeeds to the first frost and rain, a
time which the Indians employed in hunting and
laying uj) a store of game for the winter.

Boston^ Oct. 14. to Dec. 3. 1841. — It is fortunate
that Boston is at once a flourishing connnerclal port,
and the seat of the best endowed university in
America, for C^unbridgc, where Harvard College is
situated, is so near, that it may be considered as a
suburb of the metropolis. The medical lectures,
indeed, are delivered in the city, where the great
hospitals are at hand. The mingling of the pro-
fessors, both literary and scientific, with the eminent
lawyers, clergymen, physicians, and principal mer-
chants of the place, forms a society of a superior
kind ; and to these may be added several persons,
who, having inherited ample fortunes, have success-
fully devoted their lives to original researches in
history, and other departments. It is also a po-
litical advantan;e of no small moment that the Icffis-
lature assembles here, as its members, consisting in
great part of small proprietors farming their own
land, arc thus brought into contact with a com-

Chap.v. Li:cTura:8 at the LOWELL institute. 107

munity in a very advanced state of civilisation, so
that they are under the immediate check of an
enlightened public opinion. It is far more usual to
place the capital, as it is called, in the centre of the
State, often in some f>niall village or town of no
iuiportanco, and selected from mere geograpliical
considerations, which might well be disregarded in a
country enjoying such locomotive facilities. An
immense sacrifice is then required from those men of
independent fortune who, for patriotic motives, must
leave the best society of a large city, to spend the
winter in some remote spot in the discharge of
public duties.

I had been invited when in England by Mr.
Lowell, trustee and director of a richly endowed
literary and scientific institution in this city, to de-
liver a course of twelve lectures on geology during
the present autumn. According to the conditions of
the bequest, the public have gratuitous admission to
these lectures ; but by several judicious restrictions,
such as requiring applications for tickets to be made
some weeks before, and compliance with other rules,
the trustee has obviated much of the inconvenience
arising from this privilege, for it is well known that
a class which pays nothing is irregular and careless
in its attendance. As the number of tickets granted
for my lectures amounted to 4500, and the class

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108 INFLUENCE OF ORAL INSTRUCTION Chap. V.

usually attending consisted of more than 3000 per-
-sons, it was necessary to divide them into two sets,
and repeat to one of them the next afternoon the
lecture delivered on the preceding evening. It is by
no means uncommon for professors who have not
the attraction of novelty, or the advantage which I
happened to enjoy, of coming from a great distance,
to command audiences in this institution as numerous
as that above alluded to. The subjects of their dis-
courses are various, such as natural history, che-
mistry, the fine arts, natural theology, and many
others. Among my hearers were persons of both sexes,
of every station in society, from the most affluent and
eminent in the various learned professions to the
humblest mechanics, all well dressed and observing
the utmost decorum.

The theatres were never in high favour here, and
most of them have been turned to various secular
and ecclesiastical uses, and among others into lecture
rooms, to which many of the public resort for amuse-
ment as they might formerly have done to a play,
after the labours of the day are over. If the selec-
tion of teachers be in good hands, institutions of this
kind cannot fail to exert a powerful influence in im-
proving the taste and intellcvtual condition of the
people, especially where college is quitted at an

Chap. V. IN LITERATURE AND SCIENCE.

109

early age for the business of active life, and where
there is always danger in a commercial community
that the desire of money-making may be carried to
excess. It is, moreover, peculiarly desirable in a de-
mocratic state, where the public mind is apt to be
exclusively absorbed in politics, and in a country
where the free competition of rival sects has a ten-
dency to produce not indifferentism, as some at home
may be disposed to think, but too much excitement
in religious matters.

We are informed by Mr. Everett, late governor of
Massachusetts (since minister of the U. S. in Eng-
land), that before the existence of the Lowell Found-
ation, twenty-six courses of lectures were delivered
in Boston, without including those which consisted
of less than eight lectures, and these courses were at-
tended in tho aggregate by about 13,500 persons.
But notwithstanding the popularity of this form of
instruction, the means of the literary and scientific
institutions of the city were wholly inadequate to
hold out a liberal and certain reward to men of talent
and learning. There were some tew instances of
continuous courses delivered by men of eminence ; but
the task more commonly devolved upon individuals
who cultivated the art of speaking merely to become
the vehicles of second-hand information, and who

M^T i t M i^'tmmi^tmt^^

110 INFLUENCE OF ORAL INSTRUCTION. CuAP. V.

f; [

were not entitled to speak with authority, and from
the fulness of their own knowledge.*

The rich who have had a liberal education, who
know how to select the best books, and can afford
to purchase them, who can retreat into the quiet of
their libraries from the noise of their children, and,
if they please, obtain the aid of private tuition, may
doubt the utiliiy of public lectures on the fine arts,
history, and the physical sciences. But oral in-
struction is, in fact, the only means by which the
great mass of the middling and lower classes can
have their thoughts turned to these subjects, and it
is the fault of the higher classes if the information
they receive be unsound, and if the business of the
teacher be not held in high honour. The whole
body of the clergy in every coinitry, and, under
popular forms of government, the leading politicians,
have been in all ages convinced that they must avail
themselves of this method of teaching, if they would
influence both high and low. No theological dogma
is so abstruse, no doctrine of political economy or
legislative science so difficult, as to be deemed unfit
to be preached from the pulpit, or inculcated on the
hustings. The invention of printing, followed by
the ra[)id and general dispersion of the cheap daily

Sec " Everett's Memoir of John Lowell." Boston, 1840.

Chap. V. FEES OF PUBLIC LECTUREIIS.

Ill

newspaper, or tlic religious tract, have been by no
means permitted to supersede the instrmnentality of
oral teaching, and the powerful sympathy and ex-
citement created by congregated numbers. If the
leading patrons and cultivators of literature and
physical science neglect this ready and efficacious
means of interesting the multitude in their pursuits,
they are wanting to themselves, and have no right to
complain of the apathy or indifference of the public.
To obtain the services of eminent men engaged in
original researches, for the delivery of systematic
courses of lectures, is impossible without the com-
mand of much larger funds than are usually devoted
to this object. When it is stated that the fees at
the Lowell Institute at Boston are on a scale more
than three times higher than the remuneration
awarded to the best literary and scientific public
lecturers in London, it will at first be thought hope-
less to endeavour to carry similar plans into exe-
cution in other large cities, whether at home or in
tlie United States. In reality, however, the sum
bequeathed by the late Mr. John Lowell for his
foundation, though munificent, was by no means
enormous, not much exceeding 70,000/., which, ac-
cording to the usual fate awaiting donations for
educational objects, would have been all swallowed
up in the erection of costly buildings, after which

112

SINKING OF EDUCATIONAL FUNDS Chap. V.

,',t i

Ml '^

the learned would be invited to share the scanty
leavings of the " Committee of Taste," and the mer-
ciless architect, "reliquias Danaum atque immitis
Achillei." But in the present case, the testator pro-
vided in his will that not a single dollar should be
spent in brick and mortar, in consequence of which
proviso, a spacious room was at once hired, and the
intentions of the donor carried immediately into
effect, without a year's delay.

If there be any who imagine that a donation might
be so splendid as to render an anti-building clause
superfluous, let them remember the history of the
Girard bequest in Philadelphia. Half a million
sterling, with the express desire of the testator that
the expenditure on architectural ornament should be
moderate ! Yet this vast sum is so nearly consumed,
that it is doubtful whether the remaining funds will
suffice for the completion of the palace — splendid,
indeed, but extremely ill-fitted for a school-house !
It is evident that when a passion so strong as that for
building is to be resisted, total abstinence alone, as in
the case of spirituous liquors, will prove an adequate
safeguard. In the " old country," the same fatal pro-
pensity has stood in the way of all the most spirited
efforts of modern times to establish and endow new
institutions for the diffusion of knowledge. It is well
known that the sum expended in the purchase of the

Chap. V.

IN COSTLY BUILDINGS.

113

ground, and in the erection of that part of University
College, London, the exterior of which is nearly
complete, exceeded 100,000/., one-third of which was
spent on the portico and dome, or the purely orna-
mental, the rooms under the dome having remained
useless, and not even fitted up at the expiration of
fifteen years. When the professor of chemistry
enquired for the chimney of his laboratory, he was
informed that there was none, and to remove the
defect, a flue was run up which encroached on a
handsome staircase, and destroyed the symmetry of
the architect's design. Still greater was the dismay
of the anatomical professor on learning that his lecture
room was to conform to the classical model of an
ancient theatre, desicfned for the recitation of Greek
plays. Sir Charles Bell remarked that an anatomical
theatre, to be perfect, should approach as nearly as
possible to the shape of a well, that every student
might look down and see distinctly the subject under
demonstration. At a considerable cost the room was
altered; so as to serve the ends for which it was
wanted.

The liberal sums contributed by the public for
the foundation of a rival college were expended in
like manner long before the academical body came
into existence. When the professor of chemistry at
King's College asked for his laboratory, he was told
it had been entirely forgotten in the plan, but that he

114 FUNDS SUNK IN COSTLY BUILDINGS. Chap. V.

might take the kitchen on the floor below, and by in-
genious machinery carry np his aj)paratus for illus-
trating experiments, through a traj) door into an upper
story, where his lecture room was placed.

Still these collegiate buildings, in support of
which the public came forward so liberally, were left,
like the Girard College, half finished; whereas, if
the same funds had been devoted to the securing of
teachers of high acquirements, station, character, and
celebrity ; and if rooms of moderate dimensions had
been at first hired, while the classes of pupils re-
mained small, a generation would not have been lost,
the new Institutions would have risen more rapidly
to that high rank which they are one day destined to
attain, and testamentary bequests would have flowed
in more copiously for buildings well adapted to the
known and ascertained wants of the establishment.
None would then grudge the fluted column, the
swelling dome, and the stately portico ; and literature
and science would continue to be the patrons of
architecture, without being its victims.

Prescott, in his admirable work on the Conquest
of Mexico, remarks, when discussing the extent of
the ancient Aztec civilisation, that the progress made
by the Mexicans in astronomy, and especially the
fact of their having a general board for public edu-
cation and the fine arts^ proves more in favour of

Chap. V.

LOWELL FACTORIES.

115

their advancement, than the noble architectural mo-
numents which they and their kindred tribes erected.
" Architecture," he observes, " is a sensual gratifi-
cation, and addresses itself to the eye ; it is the form
in which the resources of a semi-civilised people are
most likely to be lavished." *

Mr. John Lowell, a native of Massachusetts, after
having carefully studied the educational establish-
ments of his own country, visited London in 1833,
and having sojourned there some months, paying a
visit to the University of Cambridge and other
places, he pursued his travels in the hope of ex-
ploring India and China. On his way he passed
through Egypt, where, being attacked, while en-
gaged in making a collection of antiquities, by an
intermittent fever, of which he soon afterwards died,
he drew up his last wiU in 1835, amidst the ruins
of Thebes, leaving half of his noble fortune for the
foundation of a Literary Institute in his native city.
It has already appeared how admirably he appre-
ciated the exact point of " semi-civilisation " which
the Anglo-Saxon race had then attained on both
sides of the Atlantic.

I spent an agreeable day at Cambridge, visiting
several of the professors at Harvard University, and
hearing one of them, Henry Ware, author of " The

* Conquest of Mexico, vol. i. p. 155.

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116

BLIND ASYLUM.

Chap. V.

Christian Character," a work reprinted, and much
read in England, preach a sermon in the College
Chapel. His text, " Thou shalt love thy neighbour
as thyself," led him to treat of self-love, and to ex-
plain how this natural passion might be indulged to
any extent, provided, in obedience to the divine com-
mandment, our love for others increases in the like
ratio. I heard afterwards, with great regret, of the
death of this able and amiable man.

In the Blind Asylum I saw Laura Bridgman, now
in her twelfth year. At the age of two she lost her
sight and hearing by a severe illness, but although
deaf, dumb, and blind, her mind has been so advanced
by the method of instruction pursued by Dr. Howe,
that she shows more intelligence and quickness of
feeling than many girls of the same age who are in
full possession of all their senses. The excellent re-
ports of Dr. Howe, on the gradual development of
her mind, have been long before the public, and have
recently been cited by Mr. Dickens, together with
some judicious observations of his own. Perhaps no
one of the cases of a somewhat analogous nature, on
which Dugald Stewart and others have philosophised,
has furnished so many new and valuable facts illus-
trating the extent to which all intellectual develop-
ment is dej^endent on the instrumentality of the
senses in discerning external objects, and, at the same

Chap. V.

LOWELL FACTORIES.

117

time, in how small a degree the relative acuteness of
the organs of sense determine the moral and intel-
lectual superiority of the individual.

Nov. 15. — Went twenty-six miles to the north of
Boston, by an excellent railway, to the manufactur-
ing town of Lowell, which has sprung up entirely in
the last sixteen years, and now contains about 20,000
inhabitants. The mills are remarkably clean, and
well warmed, and almost all for making cotton and
woollen goods, which are exported to the West. The
young women from the age of eighteen to twenty-
five, who attend to the spinning-wheels, are good-
looking and neatly dressed, chiefly the daughters of
New England farmers, sometimes of the poorer
clergy. They belong, therefore, to a very diflx^rent
class from our manufacturing population, and after
remaining a few years in the factory, return to their
homes, and usually marry. We are told that, to
work in these factories is considered far more elio-ible
for a young woman than domestic service, as they can
save more, and have stated hours of work (twelve
hours a day !), after which they are at liberty. Their
moral character stands very high, and a girl is paid
off, if the least doubt exists on that point. Boarding-
houses, usually kept by widows, are attached to each
mill, in which the operatives are required to board ;
the men and women being separate. This regard for

■I

118

LOWELL FACTORIES.

Chap. V.

I 'I

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^ll

1 i

the welfare and conduct of the work-people when
they are not on actual duty is comparatively rare in
England, where the greater supply of labour would
render such interference and kind superintendance
much more j)i''icticable. Still we could not ex-
pect that the results would be equally satisfactory
with us, on account of the lower grade of the
operatives, and the ignorance of the loAver classes
in England. In regard to the order, dress, and
cleanliness of the people, these merits are also exem-
plified in the rural districts of Lancashire, and it is
usually in our large towns alone, that the work
people are unhealthy and squalid, especially where
a number of the poor Irish live crowded together
in bad dwellings.

The factories at Lowell are not only on a great
scale, but have been so managed as to yield high
profits, a fact which should be impressed on the mind
of every foreigner who visits them, lest, after admiring
the gentility of manner and dress of the women and
men employed, he should go away with the idea
that he had been seeing a model mill, or a set of
gentlemen and ladies, playing at factory for their
amusement. There are few children employed, and
those under fifteen are compelled by law to go to
school three months in the year, under penalty of
a heavy fine. If this regulation is infringed, in-

Chap. V.

NATIONAL SCHOOLS.

119

formers arc not wanting, for there is a strong
sympathy in the public mind with all acts of the
legislature, enforcinjc education. The Bostonians
submit to pay annually for public instruction in their
city alone, the sum of 30,000Z. sterling, which is
about equal to the parliamentary grant of this year
(1841) for the whole of England, while the sum
raised for free schools in the state this year, by
taxes for wages of teachers, and their board, and
exclusive of funds for building, exceeds 100,000/.
sterling.

The law ordains, that every district containing
fifty families shall maintain one school, for the
support of which the inhabitants are required to tax
themselves, and to appoint committees annually for
managing the funds, and choosing their own school-
masters. The Bible is allowed to Ijc read in all, and
is actually read in nearly all the schools ; but the
law prohibits the use of books " calculated to favoiu'
the tenets of any particular sect of Christians."
Parents and guardians are expected to teach their
own children, or to procure them to be taught, what
they believe to be religious truth, and for this
purpose, besides family worship and the pulpit, there
are Sunday-schools. The system works well among
this church-building and church-going population.

As there is no other region in Anglo-saxondom,

120

EgUxVLITY OF SECTS.

Chap. V.

EJ >:

■ 1

containing 750,000 souls, where national education
has been carried so far, it is inii)ortant to enquire to
what combination of causes its success is mainly to
be attributed. First, there is no chiss in want or
extreme poverty here, partly because the facility of
migrating to the west, for those who are without
emi)loyment, is so great, and also, in 2)art, from the
check to improvident marriages, created by the high
standard of living to which the lowest workpeople
aspire, a standard whicli education is raising higher
and higher from day to day. Secondly, I have often
heard politicians of opposite parties dccl.u'e, that
there is no safety for the republic, now that the
electoral suffrage has been so much extended, unless
every exertion is made to raise the moral and
intellectual condition of the masses. The fears
entertained by the rich of the dangers of ignorance,
is the only good result which I could discover
tending to counterbalance the enormous prepon-
derance of evil arising in the United States from
so near an approach to universal suffrage. Thirdly,
the political and social equality of all religious sects,

■a

— a blessing which the New Englanders do not owe
to the American revolution, for it was fully recog-
nised and enjoyed under the supremacy of the British
crown. This equality tends to remove the greatest
stumbling block, still standing in the way of national

' !

msfr^r^'fmsn xmv "wywa gwgn'

TiiAP. v.

KQUALTTY OF SECTS.

121

instruction in Great Britain, where wc allow one
generation after another of the lower classes to grow
up without being taught good morals, good l)ehaviour,
and the knowledge of things useful and ornamental,
because we cannot all agree »^ to the precise
theological doctrines in which they arc to be l)rought
up. The religious toleration of the different sects
towards each other in Massachusetts is, I fear,
accompanied by as little Christian charity as at
home, and families are often divided, and the best
relations of private life disturbed, by the bitterness
of sectarian dogmatism and jealousy ; but., politically,
all sects are ready to unite against the <?ncroach-
ments of any other, and a great degree of religious
freedom is enjoyed, in consequence of there being
no sect to which it is ungenteel to belong, no con-
sciences sorely tempted by ambition to conform to
a more fashionable creed.

In New York the Roman Catholic priests have
recently agitated with no small success for a separate
allotment of their share of the education fund.
They have allied themselves, as in the Belgian revo-
lution, with the extreme democracy to carry theii-
point, and may materially retard the general progr^'ss
of education. But there is no reason to appreh>end
that any one sect in New England will have power
to play the same game ; and these states are the chief

122

TIIANKSGIVING-DAY.

Chap. V.

colonizers of the West — gentiscunahula, by the rapi-
dity of whose multiplication and progress in civiliza-
tion the future prospects of the whole confederacy of
republics will bo mainly determined.

During our stay at Boston the citizens gave a
splendid ball to the Prince de' Joinville, and the Mayor
politely sent us tickets of invitation, which gave me
an opportunity of satisfying myself that foreigners
have not said too much of the beauty of the young
American ladies. In general I was so much occu-
pied with my lectures, or in communicating to the
Geological Society of London some of the results of
my observations during my late tour, that I had no
time to enter into society, or to accept the hospitali-
ties of the inhabitants. As soon as it was understood
that I wished to live quietly, all pressing invitations
were politely abstained from until I had finished my
course of lectures ; and afterwards, when I found it
necessary to decline a large number of them, no
offence was taken.

The twenty-fifth of November was appointed
by the Governor of the State to be what is here
called Thanksgiving-Day — an institution as old as the
times of the Pilgrim Fathers, one day in the year
being set apart for thanksgiving for the mercies of
the past year. As a festival it stands very much in
the place of Christmas Day as kept in England and
Germany, being always in the winter, and every body

i\\

Chap. V.

SOCIETY IN BOSTON.

123

jroinfr to charcli in the mornino; and meetino; in laro-c
family parties in the evening. To one of these we
were most kindly welcomed ; and the reception which
we met with here and in the few families to which
we had letters of introduction, made us entirely forget
that we were foreigners. Several of our new acquaint-
ances indeed had travelled in England and on the
Continent, and were in constant correspondence with
our own literary and scientific friends, so that we were
always hearing from them some personal news of those
with whom we were most intimate in Europe, and we
often reflected with surprise in how many parts of
England we should have felt less at home.

I remember an eminent English writer once saying
to me, when he had just read a recently-published
book on the United States, " I wonder the author
went so far to see disagreeable people, when there
are so many of them at home." It would certainly
be strange if persons of refined habits, even without
being fastidious, who travel to see life, and think it
their duty, with a view of studying character, to
associate indiscriminately with all kinds of people,
visiting the first strangers who ask them to their
houses, and choosing their companions without re-
ference to congeniality of taste, pursuits, manners, or
opinions, did not find society in their own or any
other country in the world intolerable.

G 2

12-i

SLEIGH-DRIVING AT BOSTON. CuAP. VI.

CHAPTER VT.

Fall of sno2v and sleigh-driving- at Boston. — Journey to New-
haven. — IchthyoUtes of Durham^ Connecticut. — Age of Red
Sandstone. — Income of farmers. — Baltimore.- — Washington.
— National Museum. — Natural impediments to the growth of
Washington. — Why chosen for the capital. — Richmond^
Vi?-ginia. — Effects of slave-labour. — Low Region on the
Atlantic Border., occupied by Tertiary strata. — Infusorial bed
at Richmond. — Miocene Shells and Corals in the Cliffs of
the James River compared with Fossils of the European
Crag and Faluns. — Analogy of forms and difference of
species. — Proportion of species. — Commencement of the
present Geographical distribidion of Mollu.<^ca.

Nov. 29. 1841. — Although wc were in the lati-
tude of Rome, and there were no mountains near us,
we had a heavy fall of snow at Boston this day, fol-
lowed by bright sunshine and hard frost. It was
a cheerful scene to see the sleighs gliding noiselessly
about the streets, and to hear the bells, tied to the
horses' heads, warning the passer-by of their swift
approach. As it was now the best season to geo-
logise in the southern States, I determined to make
a flight in that direction; and we had gone no farther
than Newhaven before wc found that all the snow
had disappeared. I accordingly took the opportunity
when there of making a geological excursion, with

Chap. VI. ICHTHYOLITES OF DURHAM.

125

» I

Mr. Silliman, jun., Professor Hubbard, and Mr.
Whelpley, to examine the red sandstone strata, con-
taining Ichthyolites, by the side of a small waterfall
at Middlefield, one mile from Durham, in Connecticut.
The remains of fish occur in a fine-grained slaty
sandstone, black and bituminous, about six feet thick,
which alternates with a coarse conglomerate, some of
the quartz pebbles being two or three inches in dia-
meter. Small fragments of fossil wood and a ripple-
marked surface were observed in some of the strata
near the fossil-fish. This sandstone is newer than
the coal, but we have not yet sufficient data to pro-
nounce very decidcv^'y it, its true age. The foot-
steps of numerous spe ' . of birds afford no indication,
because in Europe we have as yet no traces of birds
in rocks of such high antiquity, and consequently
no corresponding term of comparison. As to the
fish, they have most of them been referred to the
genus Paleoniscus, and have been supposed, therefore,
by analogy, to imply that the Connecticut deposit is
of the age of the Magnesian limestone (Lower New
lied or Permian Grouj) of Europe). But Mr. Ked-
field has expressed some doubt whether these Ameri-
can fossils might not constitute a new, though allied
genus, having the scales, and apparently the vertebra?,
prolonged to a more limited extent into the upper
lobe of the tail than in the European species. In

o 3

126

AGE OF RED SANDSTONE.

Chap. VI.

the language of M. Agassiz, they are less hetero-
cercal than the European Paleoiiiscus, and, therefore,
less closely related to that type which is universal in
the more ancient or paleozoic formations. Sir P.
Egerton, who confirms these remarks of Mr. Kedfield,
and adds other distinctions, such as the strong and
conical teeth, and the smallness of the oral aperture,
informs me that in the five or six distinct species ob-
tained by me from Durham, Connecticut, he finds the
scales to be smoother than in the Paleonisciof the Mag-
nesian limestone ; for the latter have their scales more
or less striated and serrated on the posterior margins.
The American fossils approximate in the character
above alluded to, or in having smooth scales, to the
coal-measure species, so that the evidence derived
from Ichthyology is very conflicting. Professor H.
D. Kogers infers from his brother's discovery in Vir-
ginia of shells in this formation, referred to the Posi-
donia Keiiperiy a characteristic species of the Euro-
pean Trias, that the Connecticut sandstone belongs
to tiie Upper New Ked or Triassic system.

In the neighbourhood of Durham we learnt
that a snow-storm, which occurred there in the first
week of October, had seriously injured the woods,
weighing down the boughs then in full leaf, and
snapping off the leading shoots. For tlie first time
in the United States I heard great concern expressed

•«r-

Chap. VI.

INCOME OF FARMERS.

127

for the damage sustained by the timber, which is
beginning to grow scarce in New England, where
coal is dear.

The valley of the Connecticut presents a pleasing
picture of a rural population, where there is neither
poverty nor great wealth. I was told by well-in-
formed persons, that if the land and stock of the
farmers or small proprietors were sold off and invested
in securities giving six per cent, interest, their average
incomes would not exceed more than from 80/. to
120Z. a year. An old gentleman who lately re-visited
Durham, his native place, after an absence of twenty-
five years, told me that in this interval the large
families, the equal subdivision of the paternal estates
among children, and the efforts made for the outfit of
sons migrating to tlie West, had sensibly lowered the
fortunes of the Connecticut yeomanry, so that they
were reduced nearer to the condition of labourers
than when he left them.

Pursuing my course southwards, I found that the
snow-storm had been less heavy at New York, still
less at Philadelphia, and after crossing the Susque-
hanna (Dec. 13.) the weather began to resemble that
of an English spring. In the suburbs of Baltimore,
the locomotive engines being detached., our cars were
drawn by horses on a railway into the middle of the
town. Maryland was the first slave state we had

G 4

128 WASHINGTON. — NATIONAL MUSEUM. Chap. VI.

visited ; and at Baltimore we were reminded for the
first time of the poorer inhabitants of a large European
city by the mean dwellings and dress of some of the
labouring class, both coloured and white.

At Washington I was shown the newly-founded
national museum, in which the objects of natural
liistorv and other treasures collected during the late
voyage of discovery to the Antarctic regions, the South
Seas, and California, are deposited. Such a national
rej)ository would be invaluable at Philadelphia, New
York, or Boston, but here there is no university, no
classes of students in science or literature, no philo-
sophical societies, no people who seem to have any
leisure. The members of Congress rarely have town
residences in this place, but, leaving their families in
large cities, where they may enjoy more refined
society, they live here in boarding-houses until their
political duties and the session are over. If the most
eminent legislators and statesmen, the lawyers of the
supreme courts, and the foreign ambassadors, had all
been assembled here for a great part of the year with
their families, in a wealthy and flourishing metropolis,
the social and political results of a great centre of in-
fluence and authority could not have failed to be
most beneficial. Circumstances purely accidental,
and not the intentional jealousy of the democracy,
have checked the growth of the capital, and deprived

fji

Chap. VI. WASHINGTON, WHY THE CAPITAL. 129

it of the constitutional ascendency which it might
otherwise have exerted. Congress first assembled in
Philadelphia, where the declaration of independence
was signed ; but after the close of the revolutionary-
war in June, 1783, a party of the disbanded army
marched to that city to demand their arrears of pay,
and surrounded the building in which the representa-
tives of the people were sitting, with fixed bayonets
for about three hours. This alarm caused them to
adjourn and meet at Princeton, New Jersey, and
afterwards to seek some other permanent seat of
government. But for this untoward event, Phila-
delphia might have remained the federal metropolis,
and in that case would certainly have lifted up her
head above other cities in the New World —

" Quantum lenta solent inter viburna cupressi."

General Washington is said to have selected the
present site of the capital as the most central spot on
the Atlantic border, being midway between Maine
and Florida, and being also at the head of the na-
vigation of a great river. He had observed that all
the other principal cities eastward of the Alleghany
mountains had sprung up on similar sites ; but un-
fortunately the estuary of the Potomac is so long
and winding, that to ascend from its mouth to
Washington is said often to take a vessel as long as

G 5

130

RICHMOND, VIRGINIA.

C HAP. VI.

to cross from Liverpool to the mouth of the river.
Had Annapolis, which is only thirty miles distant,
been chosen as the capital, it is believed that it
would, ere this, have contained 100,000 inhabitants.

We were present at an animated debate in the
House of Representatives, on the proposed protective
tariff, and a discussion in the senate on " Ways and
Means," both carried on with great order and
decorum. After being presented to the President,
and visiting several persons to whom we had letters,
we were warned by a slight sprinkling of snow that
it was time to depart and migrate further south-
\vards. Crossing the Potomac, therefore, I pro-
ceeded to Hichmond, in Virginia, where I resolved
to sail down the James E-iver, in order to examine
the geology of the tertiary strata on its shores.

On entering the station-house of a railway which
was to carry us to our place of embarkation, we
found a room with only two chairs in it. One of
these was occupied by a respectable-looking woman,
who immediately rose, intending to give it up to me,
an act betraying that she was English, and newly-
arrived, as an American gentleman, even if already
seated, would have felt it necessary to rise and offer
the chair to any woman, whether mistress or maid,
and she, as a matter of course, would have accepted

>^l * i»* * » > ' ' — '

Chap. VI. EFFECTS OF SLAVE-LABOUR.

131

the profFcred seat. After I had gone out, she told
my wife that she and her husband had come a few
months before from Hertfordshu'e, hoping to get
work in Virginia, but she had discovered that there
was no room here for poor white people, who were
despised by the very negroes if they laboured with
their own hands. She had found herself looked
down upon, even for carrying her own child, for
they said she ought to hire a black nurse. These
poor emigrants were now anxious to settle in some
free state.

As another exemplification of the impediments to
improvement existing here, I was told that a Xew
England agriculturist had bought a farm on the
south side of the James river, sold off all the slaves,
and introduced Irish labourers, being persuaded that
their services would prove more economical than
slave-labour. The scheme was answering well, till, by
the end of the third year, the Irish became very much
dissatisfied with their position, feeling degraded by
losing the respect of the whites, and being exposed
to the contempt of the surrounding negroes. They
had, in fact, lowered themselves by the habitual
performance of offices which, south of the Potomac,
arc assigned to hereditary bondsmen.

'i'

G 6

132

MIOCENE STRATA OF VIRGINIA. Chap. VI.

Miocene Tertiary Strata of Virginia.

Wq have already seen that between the hilly
country and the Atlantic there occurs in the United
States, a low and nearly level region (a, b, fig. 5.
p. 92.), occupied principally by beds of marl, clay,
and sand of the cretaceous and tertiary formations.
Maclure, in 1817, in his work on geology, laid
down with no small accuracy on a coloured map
the general limits of this great plain, and of the
granitic district lying inmiediately to the westward.
He also pointed out that at the junction of these
great geological provinces (a, b, and b, c, fig. 5.),
at tlie point h, as indicated in the section, almost all
the great rivers descend suddenly by falls or rapids
of moderate height, as the Delaware at Trenton,
the Schuylkill near Philadelphia, the Potomac near
Washington, the James river at Richmond, Virginia,
the Savannah at Augusta in Georgia, and many others.
At these points, therefore, the navigation is stopped,
and a great many large cities have sprung up
precisely at this limit, so that the line which marks
the western boundary of the tertiary, and the eastern
of the granitic region, is one of no small geological,
geographical, and political interest.

The general elevation of the great plain does not
exceed a hundred feet, although sometimes con-

Chap. VI. MIOCENE STRATA OF VIRGINIA.

133

siderably higher. Its width in the middle and
southern states is very commonly from 100 to 150
miles. The tide, except in the more southern states,
flows entirely across it, and the rivers intersecting
it form large estuaries, which may have been due
to the facility with which the incoherent materials
of the cliffs were undermined and swej)t away, a
process of waste which is still going on.

Throughout the greater part of the Atlantic plain,
the cretaceous rocks, if present, are concealed by
the overlying tertiary deposits, which consist chiefly
of Miocene strata, extending from Delaware bay
to the Cape Fear river, and occupying portions of
Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina,
an area about 400 miles long from north to south,
and varying in breadth from 10 to 70 miles. There
are, besides, some patches of the Miocene form-
ation in South Carolina and Georgia, where the
Eocene or older tertiary depo&its predominate almost
exclusively.

I began my examination of these tertiary strata
in the suburbs of Richmond, Virginia, where I saw
in Shockoe creek some Eocene marls with charac-
teristic shells, on which reposed Miocene red clay
and sand. Between the two formations a remark-
able bed of yellow siliceous clay intervenes, from
twelve to twenty-five feet thick, marked on the

!f1

■i

134

MIOCENE STRATA OP VIRGINIA. Chap. V.

surface by a band of meagre vegetation. This clay
was found by Professor W. B. llogers to be en-
tirely composed of the siliceous cases of Infusoriac,
so minute as only to be detected by a powerful
microscope, and yet exhibiting distinct specific
characters, enabling us to refer them to the Miocene
period.

Going down the James river about twenty miles
below Richmond, I found, at a place called City
Point, on the right bank, a cliff thirty feet high,
in which yellow and white sands appear, with shells
very analogous to those of the Suffolk crag, and
referable to the same age ; resting on Eocene marl
and green earth. Several miles lower, at Evergreen,
I collected abundance of shells in the upper or
Miocene formation, with great numbers of an AstartCf
resembling one of the commonest kinds of the
Suffolk crag, and accompanied by the teeth of sharks,
and bones of cetacea. Landing then at Coggin's
Point, several miles farther eastward on the Virginian
shore, I was conducted by Mr. Ruffin, son of the
editor of the Farmer's Register, to a locality where
shell-marl is procured and used for improving light
soils, just as in Suffolk and on the Loire, strata of
the same age, called crag and falun, have for cen-
turies afforded a fertilizing mixture.

Here, and at Evergreen before mentioned, large

CiiAP. VI. IIOSriTALITY OF THE PLANTERS. 13 j

flattened masses several feet wide, of a lamelliform
coral resembling an Astroia, were lying on the beach,
washed out of the Miocene marls. The species has
l)een called by Mr. Lonsdale Cohwmat'ia scxradiata,
and differs from the genus Astraja, as defined by
Ehrenberg, in the stars not being subdivided.

All the planters in this part of Virginia, to whoso
houses I went without letters of iutroductioHj
received me most politely and hospitably. To be
an Englishman engaged in scientific pursuits wrs
a sufficient passport, and their servants, horses, and
carriages, were most liberally placed at my disposal.

I then crossed to the north side of the James river
being rowed out at sunrise far from the shore to
wait for a steamer. The hour of her arrival bei^]g
somewhat uncertain, we remained for some time in
the cold, muffled up in our cloaks, in a small boat
moored to a single wooden pile driven into a snoal,
with three negroes for our companions. The situ-
ation was desolate in the extreme, both the bank?
of the broad estuary appearing low and distant, and
as wild and uninhabited as when first discovered
in 1G07, by Captain Smith, before he was taken
prisoner, and his life saved by the Indian maiden
Pocahontas. At lenofth we Qjlad^^ hailed the larjre
steamer as she came down rapidly towards us, and
my luggage was immediately taken charge of by

13G

AVILLIAMSBURG.

Chap. VI.

two of the sable crew, who called themselves Lord
WcUino-ton and Julius Ca3sar.

We disembarked in a few hours near the old
deserted village of Jamestown, at the Grove Landing,
seven miles south of Williamsburg. Here I found
the beach strewed over with innumerable fossil shells,
washed out of the sandy IMiocene marls of a cliiF
forty feet high. Some large varieties of the genus
Pcctcn were most abundant, closely packed together
in a dense bed, above which was another layer
composed almost wholly of the shells of a Chama
i^Ccongregata), both valves being united in each
individual. From the same cliff I also procured
shells of the genera Conus, Oliva, Marginellaj Fusus,
Pgrula, Murcx, Natica, and others.

We then visited Williamsburg, where there is a
University founded by William and Mary, and
therefore very ancient for this country. In the
neighbourhood I procured a rich harvest of fossil
shells, collecting in one morning with my own hands
no less than seventy distinct species, besides several
corals, in a pit at BurwcU's Mill. Upon the ^^ hole,
I procured 147 species of shells, exclusive of Balani
and corals, from this formation in the United States,
and chiefly during the present expedition and near
the banks of the James river.

That they belong to the same age as the Miocene

Chap. VI.

MIOCENE FOSSILS.

137

deposits of Europe may be inferred: — first, from
their position, as they overlie the Eocene marls
containing shells, resembling those of the London
and Paris basins : — secondly, from the close affinity
of many of the most abundant species to fossils of the
crag of Suffolk and the French faluns: — thirdly,
from the proportion of the fossil shells, identical in
species with mollusca, now inhabiting the American
coast, the proportion being about one sixth of the
whole, or about seventeen per cent, in those com-
pared by me, for I have been able to identify 23
out of 147 with living shells. This relation of the
fossil and recent fauna had already led Mr. Conrad
and the Professors Rogers to the same conclusions,
and they had correctly called these deposits Miocene.
Fourthly, the corals, of which I obtained thirteen
species, agree all generically with those of the
Miocene beds of Europe, and some specifically, as
a lunulite, the same as one from the Suffolk crag, and
Anthojihyllum hreve^ common in the faluns of Tou-
raine. Fifthly, the cetacea also agree generically,
and the fish in many cases specifically, with Euro-
pean Miocene fossils, and no remains of reptiles have
been found on either side of the Atlantic in this
formation.

When we consider how remarkably the species of
the Suffolk cracj differ from the shells of the contem-

!"•;:,

138

MIOCENE FOSSILS.

Chap. VI.

poraneous faluns of the Loire, the geologist will not
be surprised to learn that I have only met with nine
American Miocene shells, agreeing with fossils of the
same period in Europe. It is also worthy of notice
that the shells identified with recent species agree
with testacea, now living on the western side of the
Atlantic, some of which, as some kinds of i^wZ^/w?', a sub-
genus of Pyrula, and Gnathodon, an estuary shell, are
forms peculiar to America. In like manner, the fossil
shells found in the Miocene strata of Europe, which
agree with recent kinds, belong to species inhabiting
the British seas, the Mediterranean, or the African
coast of the Atlantic. Hence it follows that at the
remote period called Miocene, the seas were not only
divided as now into distinct geographical provinces,
but already that peculiar distribution of the living
mollusca which now exists had begun to prevail.
This conclusion is remarkable when we recollect that
at the geological era alluded to, the fauna was so
distinct from the present, that four fifths of the species
now living had not yet come into existence.

In regard to the climate of the Miocene period it is
not uninteresting to observe that the fossil shells of
Maryland and Virginia resemble those of Touraine
and Bourdeaux more nearly than the fossils of Suffolk.
This n ight have been expected from the nearer cor-
respondence in latitude ; and it is the presence of such

Chap. VI.

MIOCENE FOSSILS.

139

genera as Conus, Oliva, Marffinella, and Crassatella
(represented by large species), forms belonging to
warmer seas, which assimilate the American and
French deposits, and contrast both of them with ih'i
English, where no representatives of these genera
are met with. Nevertheless, it is singular that there
should be so much resemblance between the Miocene
shells of the Ijoire and Gironde and those of the James
river and other estuaries in the United States which
lie ten degrees of latitude farther south than the
French faluns, the latter being in the 47th, while
the American strata of the same age are in the 37 th
of north latitude. This circumstance may probably
be accounted for by curves in the isothermal lines
similar in their prolongation east and west, to
those now existing as pointed out by Humboldt, in
his essay on Climate.

140

PINE BARRENS OF VIRGINIA. Chap. VII.

CHAPTER VII.

Pine Ba7're7is of Virginia and North Carolina. — Raihvai/
train stopped by snow and ice. — The Great Dismal
Sivamp. — Soil formed entirely of vegetable matter. —
Rises higher than the contiguous firm land. — J3uried
timber. — Lake in the middle. — The origin of coal illus-
trated by the Great Dismal. — Objections to the theory of ar.
ancient atmosphere highly charged with carbonic acid.

Dec. 23. 1841. — From Williamsburg we went to
Norfolk in Virginia, passing down the James river
in a steamer, and from Norfolk by railway to Weldon
in North Carolina, passing for eighty miles through
a low level country, covered with fir trees, and
called the Pine Barrens. On our way we were
overtaken by rain, which turned to sleet, and in the
evening formed a coating of ice on the rails, so that
the wheels of the engine could take no hold. There
was a good stove and plenty of fuel in the car, but
no food. After a short pause, the engineer backed
the locomotive for half a mile over that part of the
rail from which the snow and ice had just been
brushed and scraped away by the passage of the
train; then, returning rapidly, he gained sufficient
momentum to carry us on two or three miles farther,

Chap. VII.

THE PINE BARRENS.

141

and, by several repetitions of this manoeuvre, he
brought us, about nightfall, to a small watering
station, where there was no inn, but a two-storied
cottage not far off.

Here we were made welcome, and as we had pre-
viously dropped by the way all our passengers except
two, were furnished with a small room to ourselves, and
a clean comfortable bed. We soon made a blazing
wood-fire, and defied the cold, although we could
see plainly the white snow on the ground through
openings in the unplastered laths of which the wall
of the house was made. Before morning all the
snow was melted, and we again proceeded on our
way through the Pine Barrens.

Our car, according to the usual construction in
this country, was in the shape of a long omnibus,
with the seats transverse, and a passage down the
middle, where, to the great relief of the traveller, he
can stand upright with his hat on, and walk about,
warming himself when he pleases at the stove, which
is in the centre of the car. There is often a private room
fitted up for the ladies, into wliich no gentleman can
intrude, and where they are sometimes supplied with
rocking-chairs, so essential to the comfort of the
Americans, whether at sea or on land, in a fashionable
drawing-room or in the cabin of a ship. It is sin-
gular enough that this luxury, after being popular

142

THE PINE BAKRENS.

Chap. VII.

1;'

for ages all over Lancashire, required transplantation
to the New World before it could be improved
and become fashionable, so as to be reimported
into its native land.

The Pine Barrens, on which the long-leafed or
pitch pines flourish, have for the most part a siliceous
soil, and form a broad belt many hundred miles in
length, running parallel to the coast, in the region
called the Atlantic Plain, before alluded to. The
sands, as we follow this region from New Jersey to
Georgia, are derived from strata of more than one
tertiary period, and there are interstratified beds of
clay, which, whenever they come to the surface in
valleys, cause swamps, where peculiar kinds of ever-
green oaks, the cypress or cedar, tall canes, and
other plants abound. Many climbers, called here
wild vines, encircle the trunks of the trees, and on
the banks of the Roanoke, near Weldon, I saw
numerous misletoes with their white berries. The
Pine Barrens retain much of their verdure in winter,
and were interesting to me from the uniformity and
monotony of their general aspect, for they constitute,
from their vast extent, one of the marked features
in the geography of the globe, like the Pampas of
South America.

There are many swamps or morasses in this low
flat region, and one of the largest of these occurs

Chap. VII.

GllEAT DISMAL SWAMP.

143

between the towns of Norfolk and Wcldon. We
traversed several miles of its northern extremity on
the railway, which is supported on piles. It bears
the appropriate and very expressive name of the
" Great Dismal," and is no less than forty miles in
length from north to south, and twenty-five miles in
its greatest width from east to west, the northern
half being situated in Virginia, the southern in
North Carolina. I observed that the water was ob-
viously in motion in several places, and the morass
has somewhat the appearance of a broad inundated
river-plain, covered with all kinds of aquatic trees
and shrubs, the soil being as black as in a peat-bog.
The accumulation of vegetable matter going on here
in a hot climate, over so vast an area, is a subject of
such high geological interest, that I shall relate what
I learnt of this singular morass. The best account
yet published of it is given by Mr. Edmund Ruffin,
the able editor of the Farmer's Register (see vol. iv.,
No. 9. January 7. 1837).

It is one enormous quagmire, soft and muddy,
except where the surface is rendered partially firm
by a covering of vegetables and their matted roots ;
yet, strange to say, instead of being lower than the
level of the surrounding country, it is actually higher
than nearly all the firm and dry land which en-
compasses it, and, to make the anomaly complete, in

144

GREAT DISMAL SWAMP.

Chap. VII.

spite of its semi-fluid character, it is higher in the
interior than towards its margin.

The only exceptions to both these statements is
found on the western side, where, for the distance of
about twelve or fifteen miles, the streams flow from
slightly elevated but higher land, and supply all
its abundant and overflowing water. Towards the
north, the east, and the south, the waters flow from
the swamp to diflerent rivers, which give abundant
evidence, by the rate of their descent, that the Great
Dismal is higher than the surrounding firm ground.
This fact is also confirmed by the measurements
made in levelling for the railway from Portsmouth
to Suflblk, and for two canals cut through different
parts of the morass, for the sake of obtaining timber.
The railway itself, when traversing the Great Dismal,
is literally higher than when on the land some
miles distant on either side, and is six to seven feet
higher than where it passes over dry ground, near to
Suffolk and Portsmouth. Upon the whole, the
centre of the morass seems to lie more than twelve
feet above the flat country round it. If the streams
which now flow in from the west, had for ages been
bringing down black fluid mire, instead of water, over
the firm subsoil, we might suppose the ground so in-
undated to have acquired its present configuration.
Some small ridges, however, of land must have

CilAP.VII. SOIL FORMED OF VEGETABLE MATTER. 145

existed in the original plain or basin, for these now
rise like low islands in various places above the
general surface. But the streams to the westward do
not bring down liquid mire, and are not charged
with any sediment. The soil of tlie swamp is formed
of vegetable matter, usually without any admixture
of earthy particles. We have here, in fact, a deposit
of peat from ten to fifteen feet in thickness, in a latitude
where, owing to the heat of the sun, and length of
the summer, no peat mosses like those of Europe
would be looked for under ordinary circumstances.

In countries like Scotland and Ireland, where the
climate is damp, and the summer short and cool, the
natural vegetation of one year does not rot away during
the next in moist situations. If water flows into
such land, it is absorbed, and promotes the vigorous
growth of mosses and other aquatic plants, and when
they die, the same water arrests their putrefaction.
But as a general rule, no such accumulation of peat
can take place in a country like that of Virginia,
where the summer's heat causes annually as large a
quantity of dead plants to decay as is equal in amount
to the vegetable matter produced in one year.

It has been already stated that there are many
trees and shrubs in the region of the Pine Barrens
(and the same may be said of the United States
generally), which, like our willows, flourish lux-

I' 'I

146

GREAT DTS^rAL 8WA:Mr.

Chap. VII.

uriantly in ■water. The juniper trees, or white cedar
( Ciiprcssus thi/oifles), stand firmly in the softest part
of the quagmire, supported by tlieirlong tap-roots, and
afford, with many other evergreens, a dark shade, under
wdiich a multitude of ferns, reeds, and shrubs, from
nine to eighteen feet high, and a thick carpet of
mosses, four or five inches high, spring up and arc
protected from the rays of the sun. "VYhen these are
most powerful, the large cedar {Ciiprcssus disticha)
and many other deciduous trees arc in full leaf.
The black soil formed beneath this shade, to which
the mosses and the leaves make annual additions,
does not perfectly resemble the peat of Europe, most
of the plants being so decayed as to leave little more
than soft black mud, without any traces of organ-
ization. This loose soil is called sponge by the
labourers; and it has been ascertained that, when
exposed to the sun, and thrown out on the bank of a
canal, where clearings have been made, it rots
entirely away. Hence it is evident that it owes its
preservation in the swamp to moisture and the shade
of the dense foliage. The evaporation continually
going on in the wet spongy soil during summer
cools the air, and generates a temperature resembling
that of a more northern climate, or a region more
elevated above the level of the sea.

Numerous trunks of larnje and tall trees lie buried

CnAP.VII.

GREAT DISMAL SWA:\ir.

147

ill the black mire of tlie morass. In so loose a soil
they are easily overthrown by winds, and nearly as
many have been found lying beneath the surface of
tlie peaty soil as standing erect upon it. When
thrown down, they are soon covered by water, and
keej^ing wet they never decompose, except the sap
wood, whicli is less than an inch thick. Much of the
timber is obtained by sounding a foot or two below
the surface, and it is sawn into planks while lialf
under water.

The Great Dismal has been described as bcino;
highest towards its centre. Here, however, there is
an extensive lake of an oval form, seven miles long,
and more than five wide, the depth, where greatest,
fifteen feet ; and its bottom, consisting of mud like
the swamp, but sometimes with a j)ure white sand, a
foot deep, covering the mud. The water is trans-
parent, though tinged of a pale brown-colour, like
that of our peat-mosses, and contains abundance of
fish. This sheet of water is usually even with its
banks, on -which a thick and tall forest grows.
There is no beach, for the bank sinks perpendicularly,
so that if tlie waters are loAvcred several feet it
makes no alteration in the breadth of the lake.

INIuch timber has been cut down and carried out
from the swamp by means of canals, which are per-
fectly straight for long distances, with the trees on

H 2

148

OllIGIX OF COAL.

Chap. VII.

each sitle arching over and ahiiost joining their
branches across, so that they throw a dark shade on
the water, wliich of itself looks black, being coloured
as before mentioned. When the boats emerge from
the gloom of these avenues into the lake, the scene
is said to be " as beautiful as fairy land."

The bears inhabiting the swamp climb trees in
search of acorns and gum berries, breaking off large
boujrhs of the oaks in order to draw the acorns near
to them. Tliese same bears arc said to kill hogs and
even cows. There are also wild cats, and occa-
sionally a solitary wolf, in the morass.

That the ancient seams of coal were produced for
the most \)avt by terrestrial plants of all sizes, not
drifted, but growing on the spot, is a theory more and
more generally adopted in modei.*n times, and the
growth of what is called sponge in such a swamp,
and in such a climate as the Great Dismal, already
covering so many square miles of a low level region
bordering the sea, and capable of spreading itself in-
definitely over the adjacent country, helps us greatly
to conceive the manner in which the coal of the
ancient Carboniferous rocks may have been formed.
The heat, perhaps, may not have been excessive
when the coal measures originated, but the entire
absence of frost, with a warm and damp atmosphere,
may have enabled tropical forms to flourish in

Chap. VII.

OIUOIN OF COAL.

149

latitudes far distant from the line. Huge swamps
in a rainy climate, standing above the level of the
surrounding firm land, and supporting a dense
forest, mny have spread far and wide, invading the
plains, like some European peat-mosses wlien they
burst ; and the frequent submergence of these masses
of vegetable matter beneath seas or estuaries, as often
as the land sunk down during subterranean move-
ments, may have given rise to the deposition of
strata of mud, sand, or limestone, immediately upon
the vegetable matter. The conversion of successive
surfaces into dry land, where other swamps sup-
porting trees may have formed, might give origin to a
continued series of coal-measures of great thickness.
In some kinds of coal, the vegetable texture is
apparent throughout under the microscope ; in
others, it has only partially disappeared; but even
in this coal the flattened trunks of trees of the
genera Lepidodenilroriy Sif/illaria, and others, con-
verted into pure coal, are occasionally met with, and
erect fossil trees are observed in the overlying strata,
terminatin<T downwards in seams of coal. The
chemical processes by which vegetable matter buried
in the earth is gi-adually turned into coal and an-
thracite has been already explained (see above,
p. 90.).

H 3

150

TIIEORr OF ATMOSPHERE

Chap. VII.

Before conclucling the remarks whicli arc naturally
suggested by a visit to the Great Dismal, I shall
say a few words on a poj)ular doctrine, favoured
by some geologists, respecting an atmosphere highly
charged with carbonic acid, in which the coal plants
are supposed to have flourished. Some imagine
the air to have been so full of choke-damp during
the ancient era alluded to, that it was unfitted for
the respiration of warm-blooded cpiadrupeds and
birds, or even rejitiles, which require a more rapid
oxv2:enation of their blood than creatures lower in the
scale of organization, such as have alone been met
with hitherto in the Carboniferous and older strata. It
is assumed tliat an excess of oxyo:en was set free when
the plants which elaborated the coal subtracted many
hundred million tons of carbon from the carbonic
acid gas -which previously loaded the air. All this
carbon was then permanently locked up in solid
seams of coal, and the chemical composition of the
earth's atmosphere essentially altered.

But they who reason thus are bound to inform us
what may have beer., the duration of the period in the
course of which so much carbon was secreted by the
pONvers of vegetable life, and, secondly, what accession
of fresli carbonic acid did the air receive in the same.
A\e know that in the present state of the globe,
the air is continually supplied with carbonic acid

Chap. VII. CHARGED WITH CAHBONIC ACID. 151

from several sources, of which the three principal are,
first, the daily putrefaction of dead animal and
vegetable substances ; secondly, the disintegration of
rocks ch.i^ged with carbonic acid and organic matter;
and, thirdly, the copious evolution of this gas from
mineral springs and the earth, especially in volcanic
countries. By that law which causes two gases of
different specific gravity, when brought into contact,
to become uniformly diffiised and mutually absorbed
through the whole space which they occupy, the
heavy carbonic acid finds its way upwards through
all parts of the atmosphere, and the solid materials of
large forests are given out from the earth in an in-
visible form, or in bubbles rising through the water
of springs. Peat-mosses of no slight depth, and
covering thousands of square miles, are thus fed with
their mineral constituents without materially de-
ranging the constituents of the atmosphere breathed
by man. Thousands of trees grow uj), float down to
the delta of the Mississippi, and other rivers, and are
buried, and yet the air, at the end of many ccnturie:.,
may be as much impregnated with carbonic acid as
before.

Coral reefs are year after year growing in the
ocean — springs and rivers feed the same ocean with
carbonic acid and lime ; but we have no reason to
infer that when mountain masses of calcareous rock

u 4

I II

!> '2

152 ATMOSPHERE OF CARBONIC ACID. Chap. YII.

have thus been gmdually formed in the sea, any-
essential change in the chemical composition of its
waters has been brought about. AYe have no accurate
data as yet for measuring wliether in our own time,
or at any remote geological era, the relative supply
and consumption of carbon in the air or the ocean
causes the amount of those elements to vary greatly ;
but the variation, if admitted, would not have caused
an excess, but rather a deficit of carbon in the pe-
riods most jiroductive of coal or peat, as compared to
any subsequent or antecedent epochs. In fact, a
climate favouring' the rank and luxurious o'rowth of
plants, and at the same time checking their decay,
and giving rise to peat or accunmlations of vegetable
matter, might, for the time, diminish the average
amount of carbonic acid in the atmosphere — a state
of things precisely the reverse of that assumed by
those to whose views I am now objecting.

l#^*/'« (!»««)•-* '*-' •■*•• •-••— ■^.«'— .^^f

Chap. VIII.

TOUR TO CIIAKLESTON.

153

CHAPTER VIII.

Tour to Charleston:, South Carolina. — Facilities of Locomotion.
— Augusta. — Voyage doivn the Savannah River. — Shell
Bluff. — Slave-Labour. — Fever and Ague. — Millhaven. —
Pine Forests of Georgia. — Alligators and Land- Tortoises. —
Wa7'mth of Climate in January. — Tertiary Strata on the
Savannah. — Fossil Remains of Mastodon and Mylodon near
Savannah. — Passports required of Slaves. — Cheerfulness of
the Negroes.

Dec. 28. — Charleston, South Carolina. AVe
arrived here after a journey of 160 miles through the
pine forests of North Carolina, between Welclon and
Wihnington, and a voyage of about 17 hours, in a
steam ship, chiefly in the night between Wihuington
and this place. Here we find ourselves in a genial
climate, where the snow is rarely seen, and never lies
above an hour or two upon the ground. The rose,
the narcissus, and other flowers, are still lingering
in the gardens, the woods still verdant with the
magnolia, live oak, and long-leaved pine, while the
dwarf fan pahn or j)almctto, frequent among the
underwood, marks a more southern region. In less
than four weeks since we left Boston, we have passed
from the 43d to the 33d degree of latitude, carried
often by the power of steam for several hundred miles

H 5

154

FACILITIES OF LOCOMOTION. Chap. VIII.

together through thinly iicoplecl wildernesses, yet
sleeping every night at good inns, and contrasting
the facilities of locomotion in this new country with
the difficulties we had contended with the year before
when travelling in Europe, through populous parts
of Touraine, Brittany, and other provinces of France.
At Charleston I made acquaintance with several
persons zealously engaged in the study of natural
history, and then went by an excellent railway 136
miles through the endless pine woods to Augusta, in
Georgia. This journey, which would formerly have
taken a week, was accomplished between sunrise and
sunset ; and, as wo scarcely saw by the way any
town or village, or even a clearing, nor any human
habitation except the station houses, the spirit of en-
terprise displayed in such public works filled me with
astonishment which increased the farther I went South.
Starting from the sea-side, and imagining that we
had been on a level the whole way, wc were surprised
to find in the evening, on reaching the village of Aikin,
sixteen miles from Augusta, that wc were on a height
several hiuidred feet above the sea, and that wc had
to descend a steep inclined plane to the valley of the
Savannah river. The strata cut througli here in
making the railway consist of vermilion-coloured
earth and clay, and white quartzosc sand, with
masses of pure Avhite kaolin intermixed. These

Chap. VIII.

AUGUSTA.

155

strata belong to the older or Eocene tertiary form-
ation, which joins the clay-slate and granitic region
a few miles above Augusta, where I visited the
rapids of the Savannah.

I liad been warned by my scientific friends in the
North, that the hospitality of the planters might
greatly interfere with my schemes of geologizing in
the Southern states. In the letters, therefore, of
introduction furnished to me at Washington, it was
particularly requested that information respecting
my objects, and facilities of moving speedily from
place to place, should be given me, instead of dinners
and society. These injunctions were every where
kindly and politely complied with. It was my
intention, for the sake of getting a correct notion of
the low country between the granitic region and the
Atlantic, to examine the cliffs bounding the Sa-
vannah river from its rapids to near its mouth, a
distance, including its windings, of about 250 miles.
After passing a few days at Aiigusta, where, for the
first time, I saw cotton grov/ing in the fields, I em-
barked in a steam boat employed in the cotton trade,
and went for foity miles down the great river, which
usually flows in a broad alluvial plain, with an
average fall of about one foot per mile, or 250
feet between Augusta and the sea. Like tlie
Mississippi and all Ira'ge rivers, which, in the flood

H 6

■p/'i'

If
I

156

SHELL BLUFF.

Chap. VIII.

season^ are densely charged with sediment, the
Savannah has its immediate banks higher than the
plain intervening between them and the high grounds
beyond, whicl.' usually, however distant from the
river, jiresent a steep cliff or "bluff" towards it.
The low flat alluvial plain, overflowed in great part
at this rainy season, is covered with aquatic trees,
and an ornamental growth of tall canes, some of them
reaching a height of twenty feet, being from one to
two inches in diameter, and with their leaves still
green. The lofty cedar (^Cupressus disticha\ now
leafless, towers above them, and is remarkable for the
angular bends of the top boughs, and the large thick
roots which swell out nenr the base.

I landed first at a cliff about 120 feet high,
called Shell Blufl", from the large fossil oysters
which are conspicuous there. About forty miles
below Augusta, at Demery's Ferry, the place where
we disembarked, the waters were so high that we
were carried on shore by two stout negroes. In the
absence of the proprietor to whom I had letters, Ave
were hospitably received by his overseer, who came
down to the river Ijank, with two led horses, on one
of which Avas a lady's saddle. He conducted us
through a beautiful wood, where the verdure of the
evergreen oaks, the pines, and hollies, and the
mildness of the air, made it diflicult for us to beneve

ill

Chap. VIII.

SLAVE L ABO UK.

157

that it was mid-winter, and that we had been the
month before in a region of snow storms and sledges.
We crossed two creeks, and after riding several miles
reached the house, and were shown into a spacious
room, where a great wood fire was kept up constantly
on the hearth, and the doors on both sides left open
day and night.

Heturning home to this hospitable mansion in the
dusk of the evening of the day following, I was sur-
prised to see, in a grove of trees near the court-yard
of the ftirm, a large wood-fire blazing on the ground.
Over the fire hung three cauldrons, filled, as I after-
wards learned, with hog's lard, and three old negro
women, in their usual drab-coloured costume, were
leaning ovev the cauldrons, and stirring the lard to
clarify it. The red glare of the fire was reflected
from their faces, and I need hardly say how much
they reminded me of the scene of the witches in
Macbeth. Beside them, moving slowly backwards
and forwards in a rocking-chair, sat the wife of the
overseer, muffled up in a cloak, and suffering from a
severe cold, but obliged to watch the old ^4aves, who
are as thoughtless as children, and might spoil the
lard if she turned away her head for a few minutes.
When I inquired the meaning of this ceremony, I
was told it was " killing time," this being the coldest
season of the year, and that since I left the farm in

158

SLAVE LABOUR.

Chap. VIII.

the morning thirty hogs had been sacrificed by the
side of a runnino; stream not far off. These were
destined to serve as winter provisions for the ne-
groes, of whom there were about a hundred on this
plantation. To supply all of them with food, clothes,
and medical attendants, young, old, and impotent, as
well as the able-bodied, is but a portion of the
expense of slave-labour. They must be continually
superintended by trustworthy whites, who might
often perform no small part of the task, and far more
effectively, with their own hands.

I fossilized for three days very diligently at Shell
Bluff, obtaining more than forty species of shells,
chiefly casts, referable to ""he Eocene formation ; of
which I shall speak by-and-Ly.

Resuming our voyage, thirty miles further down
the river, in another large cotton steam-boat, we
were landed at Stony Bluff, in Georgia, where I
wished to examine the rocks of burr-stone. There
was no living being or hal)itation in sight. The
large steamer vanished in an instant, sweeping down
the swollen river at the rate of seventeen miles an
hour, and it seemed as if we had been dropped down
from a balloon, witli our luggage, in the midst of a
wilderness. I began by exercising my hammer on
the burr-stone of this low bluff; a cellular kind of
flint, sometimes used for millstones, and full of silicified

b I

CUAP. VIII.

FEVER AND AGUE.

159

corals and minute shells, and, as I afterwards found,
by aid of a powerful microscope, of sponges. It is an
Eocene formation, and alternates with beds of red
loam. After making a collection of specimens, I
walked about the wood, and found a lone house, at
the door of which a woman was sitting, in a languid
state of health. She said she had just recovered from
the fever, or chill ; and among other inquiries, asked
when we had last had this complaint. On being told
we had never had it, she said, " I should like to live
in your country, for among the Whites there is not
one in this section of Georgia that has escaped." It
is true, that consumption, so common in the Northern
states, and so often fatal, is unknown here ; but the
universality of the ague makes these low districts in
the Southern states most unenviable dwelling-places.
The best season for a geological tour in this part of
Georgia and South Carolina, east of the mountains, is
from December to April inclusive.

I waited for the return of the owner of the lone
house, and told him I wished to visit the plantation
of Colonel Jones, at Millhaven. lie consented to
let me hire his barouche with one horse, telling me
I must send it back the best way I could, after find-
in;^' my own way for twelve miles through the pine-
forest, as he could spare me no driver. The lanes
through tlie wood were numerous, and a storm had

I *

liii'

IGO

riXE FOllESTS OF GEOllGIA. Cuap. VIII.

blown down so many tall jnues across the roacl, each
of which it was necessary to circiininavigatc, that wc
thouirht ourselves fortunate when we arrived safe at
the destined haven. My new host added to the

kindness and frankness of a Southern planter, what I

had little expected in the midst of this foiCc:, a strong
love for my favou vite pursuits, and guided me at once
to Jacksonborough, and other neighbouring places,
best worthy the attention of a geologist.

We had many long rides together through those
woods, there being no underwood to prevent a horse
from galloping freely in every direction. The long-
leaved pines emit a faint odour somewhat resembling
that of the hyacinth, and their bright-green foliage
was finely brought out against the clear blue sky.
The air was balmy, and unusually warm, even for
Georgia in the first week of January. Wc saw se-
veral butterflies, one of a bright yellow colour, and
bats flying about in the evening. The croaking of
the frog and the chirping of the cricket were again
heard. They had been silent a few days before,
when the air was cooler. The sheep which remain
out in these woods all the winter, are now fol-
lowed by lambs about three weeks old. I saw many
black squirrels here, but only heard of the opossum,
racoon, bear, and alligator, without seeing any. A
few days ago, an alligator was shot fourteen feet

V I

Cn.vp. VIII.

LAND TOmOISE.

161

long, In the act of carrying off a pig; and tlic sports-
men complain to me tliat they devour their dogs
■\vlicn they follow the deer, which, on the first alarm,
usually take to the Savannah river.

I frequently observed the holes of the gopher, a
kind of land-tortoise, whidi burrows in the sand, and
is now hybernating below ground. Four or fi^•e in-
liabit one hole : their enfji's are rather smaller tlian a
hen's. Tliey are gregarious, and in summer are seen
feeding ten or twelve togetlier on the low shrubs.
They are said to be very strong for their size, and
a negro-woman assured a lady of our party that
she was so light that she might be " toted by a
gopher." We also saw small hillocks, such as are
thrown up by our moles, made by a very singular ani-
mal, which they call a salamander, because, I believe,
it is often seen to appear when the woods are burnt.
It is not a reptile, but a species of rat (^Pseudostoma
pinetorum), with pouches on its cheeks.

On quitting Millhaven, instead of continuing my
voyage down the river, I hired a carriage to convey
us to the town of Savannali, a distance of nearly one
hundred miles. Here and there I went down from
the high road to examine the river-cllfts, consisting
of bright red-coloured loam, red and grey clay, and
white sand. At Hudson's Reach and other points I
found Eocene shells and fishes' teeth, chiefly of the

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162

T L R KE Y-B U ZZ AK DS.

Chap. VIII.

! I
ii I

genera MijUohates and Lamna. One day, on return-
ing from the river, I came suddenly in the wood on
some turkey-buzzards feeding on a dead hog. I had
often seen since we crossed the Potomac these large
black and grey birds soaring at a great height in the air,
but I was now surprised to see one of them perch on
a stump a few yards from me, and seem perfectly
fearless. In our last day's journey, I remarked, for
the first time in America, a large flight of I'ooks,
some wheeling about in the air, others perched on
trees.

Near the village of Ebenezer we passed over a
long causeway, made of logs, which for three quarters
of a mile was under water. The tall cedars (^Cu~
jyressits disficha), and other trees arching over and
forming a long aisle, reminded me exactly of the de-
scriptions given of the canals in the Great Dismal
Swamp. Some of the myrtles in these wet grounds
are very fragrant.

We were pursuing a line of road not much fre-
quented of late, since the establishment of the rail-
way from Augusta to Charleston. Our arrival,
therefore, at the inns was usually a surprise, and in-
stead of being w^Vomed, we were invariably recom-
mended to go on ff rther. When once admitted, we
were made very comfortable, having <.uv meals with
the family, and being treated more like guests than

Chap. VIII. ARRIVAL AT SAVANXAII.

1G3

'">«

ciistoiners. On one occasion our driver, to whose
brotlier our carriage and horses belonged, fell in with
the son of a neighbouring planter, who reproached him
in a friendly manner for not having come to his house
tlie night before, and brought us with him. The
social equality which prevails here arises not so much
from the spirit of a republican government, as from
the fact of the whites constituting an aristocracy for
whom the negroes work. Had we availed ourselves
of letters of introduction freely offered to us, we
might have passed from the house of one hospitable
planter to another, and heard as little of reckonings
at inns as Don Quixote expected, after his study of
tlie histories of knights errant.

Jan. 10. 1842. — On the tenth day after leaving
Augusta, we arrived at Savannah, from whicli town
I immediately set out on an excursion through a flat,
swampy country, resembling a large delta, to Beauly
and the Vernon river, about fifteen miles to the
south-east. I went by Heyner's Bridge, on the
White Bluff creek, to see a spot about twelve miles
from Savannah, where I had learnt from Dr. Haber-
sham that bones of the mastodon and other extinct
mammalia had been discovered. The bed of clay,
about six feet thick, containing them, can only be
seen at low water, and I descended to it in a boat
when the tide was out ; and by the aid of the negroes,

164

FOSSIL REMAINS.

Chap. VIII.

obtained the grinder of the common American mas-
todon. The stratum enclosing these and other bones
rests immediately on sand containing marine shells of
living species, and is covered by the mud of a fresh-
water swamp, in which trees grow, and when thrown
down by the winds, become occasionally imbedded.
One of the teeth given to me from this place by
Dr. Habersham Avas ascertained, by IMr. Owen, to be
referable to his new genus, Mijloclon. INIr. Hamilton
Couper afterwards sent me from a similar geological
position, farther south in Georgia, near the mouth of
the Alatamaha, the tooth of a megatherium. It is
evident, from his observations and my own, that at
a comparatively recent period since the Atlantic was
inhabited by the existing species of marine testacea,
there was an upheaval and laying dry of the bed of
the ocean in this region. The new land supported
forests in which the megatherium, mylodon, mastodon,
elephant, a species of horse different from the com-
mon one, and other quadrupeds, lived, and were oc-
casionally buried in the swamps. There have also
been subsidences on the coast, and perhaps, far in-
land; for in many places near the sea there arc
signs of the forest having become submerged, the
remains of erect trees being seen enveloped in stra-
tified mud and sand : I even suspect that this coast
is now sinking down, at a slow and insensible rate,

CllAP. VIII.

FOSSIL REMAINS.

IGj

for tlie sea Is encroaching and gaining at many points
on the frcsli-water marches. Thus at Bcauly I found
upright stumps of trees of the pine, cedar, and ilex
covered with live oysters and barnacles, and exposed
at low tide ; the deposit in which they were buried
having been recently washed away from around the ii
by the waves. I also observed, that the flat country
of marshes was bounded on its western or inland side
by a steep bank or ancient cliff cut in the sandy ter-
tiary strata, and there are other inland cliffs of the
same kind at diflerent heights implying the suc-
cessive elevation above the sea of the whole tertiary

region.

Not only in South Carolina and Georgia, but also
in the low region of North Carolina, as for example,
fifteen miles below Newberne, the remains of extinct
quadrupeds have been met with. The tootli of a
horse found in the latter place, with the bones of
mastodon, elephant, and other mammalia, was pre-
sented to me by INIr. Conrad, remarkably curved, and
agreeing, in this respect, with a fossil tooth discovered
by Mr. Darwin on the north side of the Plata, in
Entrc Rios, in South America, where it accompanied
the mastodon and megatherium. As no species of
equus existed in the New World when it was dis-
covered in the fifteenth century, naturalists were in-
clined, at first, to be incredulous in regard to the

1G6

FOSSIL RKMAINS.

Chap. VIII.

real antiquity of this fossil ; but as the tooth is more
curved than in the recent horse, ass, or zebra, the
fossil species may have difFered as widely from any
living representative of this genus, as the zebra or
wild ass from the horse of Arabia.

It is a fact well worthy of attention that in the
southern states of the Union so many extinct qua-
drupeds, such as the mastodon, elephant, megathe-
rium, mylodon, and horse, should occur, agreeing,
some specifically and others in generic characters,
with those found in corresponding latitudes in South
America near the river Plata, and in Patagonia, or
between latitudes 31° and 50° S., and that in both
hemispheres they should be accompanied by marine
fossil shells of recent species, as Mr. Darwin has shown
to be the case in the Pampas. Yet, although these
quadrupeds arc so modern, geologically speaking, as
to have co-existed with the present testaceous fauna,
we cannot attribute their extermination to the agency
of man ; for it is not the huge beasts alone, but qua-
drupeds as small as the rat, which have become ex-
tinct in South America within the same period, as
Mr. Lund, the Danish naturalist, has shown in re-
ference to Brazil.

On the beach at Beauly I saw numerous foot-
tracks of racoons and opossums on the sand, which
had been made during the four hours inmiediatcly

Chap. VHL

LAND CUAIJS.

If)

prccciling, or si'incc the ebbing of the tklo. Ahvady
sonie of them were lialf filled with fine blown yantl,
showing the process by which distinct casts may be
formed of the footsteps of animals in a stratum of
quartzose sandstone. I remarked that the tracks of
the racoons could be traced at several jioints to beds
of oysters, on which these animals are said to feed.
The negroes told me, that sometimes a large oyster
closes his shell suddenly, and holds the racoon fast
by his paw till the returning tide comes up and
drowns him.

The surface of the beach for half a mile was co-
vered with small round pellets of mud as thick as
hailstones, of the size of currants and peas, and
arranged for the most part in small heaps. These
arc made by thousands of land crabs {^Gclasimus vo-
cans ?), which they call fiddlers, because the motion
of their claws is compared to the arm of a player on
the violin. By the side of each heap was a per-
pendicular hole several inches deep, into which when
alarmed the crab retreats sideways, sometimes dis-
appearing, but often leaving the larger claw pro-
jecting above for want of room. They make these
holes by rolling the wet sand into pellets, and then
bringing up each ball separately to the surface.

A planter of this country told me it was amusing
to see a flock of turkies driven down for the first

168 TASSrORTS IIEQUIUED FOR SLAVES. CirAP.VIir.

time from the interior to feed on the crabs in the
marine marshes. Tliey, at first, walk about in a
ludicrous state of alarm, expecting their toes to bo
pinched, but after a time, one bolder than the rest is
tempted by hunger to snap up a small fiddler, after
which the rest fall to and devour them by thousands.
On my way through the woods in this low region
near Savannah, I saw some fine magnolias ninety
feet high, pahnettos six feet high in tufts, and oaks
hung with white pendant wreaths, sometimes ten
feet long, of the wiry parasitic Tillandsia usna3oides.
This climber, which also festoons the woods in South
America, much resembles the lichen called in England
'' old man's beard," but is a phenogamous plant.

In order to sec the bed of clay containing the
bones of the mastodon at Heyner's Bridge, it was
necessary for me to be on the ground by daybreak
at low tide. With this view, I left Savannah in the
middle of the night. The owner of the property
kindly lent me his black servant as a guide, and I
found him provided with a passport, without which
no slave can go out after dusk. The exact streets
through which he was to pass in his way to me were
prescribed, and htid he strayed from this route he
might have been committed to the guard-house.
These and other precautionary regulations, equally
irksome to the slaves and their masters, are said to

Chap. VIII. CTTEERF[TLXESS OF NEGROES.

IGl)

have become necessary after an insurrection brought
on by abolitionist missionaries, who arc spoken of
here in precisely the same tone as incendiaries, or
beasts of prey whom it would be meritorious to shoot
or hang. In this savage and determined spirit I
heard some planters speak who were mild in their
manners, and evidently indulgent to their slaves.
Nearly half the entire population of this state are of
the coloured race, who are said to be as excitable as
they are ignorant. Many proprietors live with their
wives and children quite isolated in the midst of the
slaves, so that the danger of any popular movement
is truly appalling.

The negroes, so far as I have yet seen them, whe-
ther in domestic service or on the farms, appear very
cheerful and free from care, better fed than a large
part of the labouring class of Europe ; and, though
meanly dressed, and often in patched garments, never
scantily clothed for the clinuite. We asked a woman
in Georgia, whether she wfti the slave of a family of
our acquaintance. She replied, merrily, " Yes, I
belong to them, and they belong to me." She was,
in fact, born and brought up on the estate.

On another occasion we were proceeding in a well-
appointed carriage with a planter, when we came
unexpectedly to a dead halt. Inquiring the cause,
the black coachman said he had dropped one of his

170

NEGRO COACIIMAX.

ClIAI'. VIII.

white gloves on the road, and must drive hack and
try to find it. He could not recollect witliin a mile
where he had last seen it : we remonstrated, hut in
vain. As time pressed, the master in despair took
off his own gloves, and, saying he had a second pair,
gave them to him. When our charioteer had de-
liberately put them on, we started again.

Chap. IX.

IIETURN TO CHARLESTON.

171

CHAPTER IX.

Return to Charleston. — Fossil human skeleton. — Geographical
distribution of quadrupeds in North America. — Seccre
frost in 1835 in South Ca7'olina. — White limestone of the
Cooper River and Suntce Canal. — Referred to the Eocene
period., not intermediate between tertiary and chalk. — Lime-
sinks. — Species of shells common to Eocene stnda in America
and Europe. — Causes of the increased insalnbrity of the low
region of South Carolina. — Condition of the slave popidation.
— Cheerfulness of the negroes : their vanity. — State of animal
existence. — Invalidity of marriages. — The coloured population
multiply faster than the ichites. — Effects of the interference of
abolitionists. — Laivs against education. — Gradual emancipation
equally desirable for the ivhites and the colow'ed race.

Jan. 13. 1842. — From Savannah we returned to
Charleston in a steam-ship, on board of which we
found an agreeable party, consisting chiefly of officers
of the U. S. army returning from Florida, where they
had nearly brought to a close a war of extermina-
tion carried on for many years against the Seminole
Indians. They gave a lively picture of the hardships
they underwent in the swamps and morasses during
this inglorious campaign, in the course of which the
lives of perhaps as many whites as Seminoles were
sacrificed; The war is said to have been provoked
by the attacks of the Indians on new settlers.

I 2

172

FOSSIL HUMAN SKELETON.

CUAV. IX.

I f

Tn tlic Musciun at Charleston, I was slmwn a
fossil liunian skull from (fua(lalouj)Cj iinbakletl in
solicl limestone, which they say hclongs to the same
skeleton of a female as that now preserved in the
British INIuseum, where the skull is wanting.

Dr. l>achman whom I saw here is cng;nge(l in a
great work on the quadrupeds of North Ameriea. lie
pointed out to me the boundary of several distinct
zones of indigenous mammalia, extending eastand west
on this continent, Avhere there are no great natural
barriers running in the same direction, such as moun-
tain ridges, deserts, or wide arms of the sea to check
the migrations of species. The climate alone has been
sufficient to limit their range. The mammiferous
fauna of the State of New York, comprising about
forty species, is distinct from that of the arctic region
600 miles north of it, and described by Dr. Richard-
son. It is equally distinct from that of South Ca-
rolina and Georgia, a territory about as far distant
to the south. In Texas, where frosts arc unknown,
another assemblage of species is met with. The opos-
sum, for example, of that country {Didelphis cancri-
vora) is different from that of Virginia. The latter
(^Didelphis virginiana) is one of those species which
is common to many provinces, extending from Florida
as far north as Pennsylvania, where it has been ob-
served while the snow was lying two feet deep on

i-i

Chap. IX.

SEVERE FIIOST.

173

the ground. The racuou luus u still wider habitation,
ranging aa did the biifi'alo originally {Bison ameri'
catiu.s) from the north of Canada to the Gulf of
Mexico. 13ut these are exceptions to the general
rule. Similar restrictions seem to have prevailed in
the era of extinct quadrupeds, the great mastodon
{M. gi(janteus) having evidently abounded in Canada
and New York, as well as Kentucky and Georgia,
while the megatherium and mylodon were almost
entirely confined to the southern Stjites.

When discoursing here on the influence of climate,
many accounts were given me of a frost which vi-
sited Charleston in February, 1835, so severe that
wine was frozen in bottles. The tops of the Pride-
of- India tree, of Chinese origin, were killed : all the
oranges, of w hlch there were large orchards, were de-
stroyed. Beds of oysters, exposed between high and
low water mark, perished in the estuaries, and the
effluvia from them was so powerful as to injure the
health of the inhabitants.

Several planters attribute the failure of the cotton
crop this year (1842) to the unusual size and number of
the icebergs, which floated southwards last spring from
Hudson's and Baffin's Bays, and may have cooled
the sea and checked the early growth of the cotton
plant. So numerous and remote are the disturbing
causes in meteorology ! Forty degrees of latitude

I 3

174

TEUTIAIIY FORMATIONS.

Chap. IX.

intervene between the region where the ice-floes are
generated and that where the crops are raised, whose
death-warrant they are supposed to have carried with
them.

Before I visited the southern States, I had heard
from several American geologists that calcareous
rocks occurred there intermediate in age between the
chalk and the tertiary formations, and helping to fill
the void which separates those two well-marked eras
in the European series. Having satisfied myself that
all the white limestone of the Savannah river was
referable to the Eocene epoch, I now set out to de-
termine whether the same could be said of that ex-
posed to view on the Cooper river and Santee canal,
about thirty miles north of Charleston. I was ac-
companied in an excursion of a week by Dr. Ravenel,
who kindly oifered to be my guide ; and we first vi-
sited a plantation of his, called " The Grove," near
the mouth of the Cooper river, where, in the marshes,
there are deep deposits of clay and sand, enclosing
the stools and trunks of the cypress, hiccory, and
cedar, often imbedded in an erect position, which
must have grown in fresh water, but are now sunk
six and even sixteen feet below the level of high
water. Every where there are proofs of the coast
having sunk, and the subsidence seems to have gone
on in very modern times ; for some old cedars still

i %

)

Chap. IX.

FOSSIL MASTODON.

175

standing on the surface have been killed by the en-
croachment of the salt water. We had come from
Charleston in a small private steam-boat, and after
passing Strawberry Ferry and entering the Santee ca-
nal, were allowed by favour to pass through the locks
without paying tolls, and, contrary to the usual regula-
tions, which exclude steam-boats. The thoughtless
negroes allowed the chimney of our vessel to get so
choked up with soot that we were soon forced to
quit this conveyance, and travel by land. The barges
on the canal are constructed of different sizes, so that,
after going down laden with cotton, they are put one
into another when returning empty, and thus escape
a large part of the tolls at the locks. The slaves are
fond of cock-fighting ; and on the prow of each barge
there stood usually a game-cock, perched as if he
were the ensign of the vessel.

We passed the Brygon Swamp, about forty miles
north of Charleston, where the remains of the mas-
todon were found when the canal was cut. Wild
animals might still be mired in this same morass,
latitude 33° 20' N., showing that these fossils in the
southern States occur in precisely the same geological
position as in New York and Canada. We slept at
Wantoot, and then went by Eutaw to Vance's
Ferry on the Santee river, then to Cave Hall, exa-
mining the tertiary white marl and limestone, and

I 4

i ii '

176

LIME-SINKS.

Chap. IX.

collecting the shells and corals contained in it. Lime-
sinks, or funnel-shaped cavities, are frequent in this
country, arising from natural tunnels and cavities in
the subjacent limestone, through some of which sub-
terranean rivers flow. An account was given me of
a new hollow which opened about fifteen years ago,
about two miles south of the Santee river, into which
a mule drawing a plough sank suddenly. About a
hundred yards from the same spot, I saw a large
cavern sixty feet high at its entrance in the white
limestone, from the mouth of which flowed a small
stream. The undermining eftect of such rivers ex-
plains the linear arrangement so common in lime-
sinks in South Carolina and Georgia. The walls
of such " sinks " are vertical, and the strata ex2)0sed
to view consist usually of clay and sand, which rest
upon the limestone.

From Cave Hall we went in a north-westerly di-
rection to Stoudenmire Creek, a tributary of the
Santee, where the siliceous burr-stone and brick-red
loam appear above the white limestone. In the
course of this examination, I satisfied myself that the
limestone and white marl, a formation which must
sometimes amount to 120 feet in thickness, in the
low region of Cooper river and the Santee canal,
arc a continuation of the same Eocene deposit which
I had seen at Shell BluflP, at Jacksonboro', and other

Chap. IX.

EOCENE FOSSILS.

177

places on the Savannah river, and which I after-
wards observed at Wihnington, in North Carolina.
I found many species in all these places, common to
those of Claiborne, in Alabama, where the largest
number (more than 200) of Eocene shells in a good
state of preservation have been met with ; and are
described and figured in the works of Mr. Conrad and
Mr. Lea of Philadelphia. Dr. Kavenel pointed out
to me some remarkable new sj^ecies of Scutella at
the Grove, near the mouth of the Cooper river, and
these were accompanied by several well-known Eocene
shells like those of Claiborne. The same white
limestone and marl may be said to be continuous
for forty miles, from the Grove to the Santee river.

At Eutaw and other points, corals of the genera
Idmonea, Aci/stis, Pustulopora, Vlnculai^ia, and Es-
chara occur, with a species of Scalaria, and other
shells. These fossils, and the rock containing them,
reminded me so much of the straw-coloured lime-
stone of the cretaceous formation seen on the banks
of Timber Creek, in New Jersey, that I do not
wonder that some errors had arisen from confound-
ing the tertiary and secondary deposits of the south.
The species, however, prove on closer inspection to
be different. This lithological resemblance of the
rocks seems to have led to the admission into Dr.
Morton's list of the cretaceous fossils of North

I 5

178

EOCENE SHELLS.

Chap. IX.

America ; a list for the most part very correct, of the
following seven tertiary species which really came
from the Eocene strata of South Carolina. These are,
Balanus peregrinus, Pecten calvatusy P, membranosus,
Terebratula lachryma, Conus gyratus, Scutella Lyelli,
and Echinus infulatus (see Morton's Synopsis, pi. 10.).
The belief that all these species were common to the
chalk and tertiary strata led naturally to the opinion
that in the southern States a formation existed inter-
mediate in character between the rocks of the se-
condary and those of the tertiary periods.

I consider the burr-stone and associated clays and
sands of Stoudenmire and Aikin, South Carolina, and
of Augusta, Millhaven, and Stony Bluff, in Georgia,
to belong also to an Eocene deposit, and to be higher
in the series than the white limestone formation.

Out of 125 species of Eocene shells which I col-
lected in the southern States, or which were presented
to me, I have only been able to identify seven with
European species of the same epoch. These are
Trochus agglutinans. Solarium canaliculatum, Bo"
nellia terebellata, Infundibulum trochiformey Litlio-
domus dactyluSf Cardita planicosta, and Ostrea bcU
lovacina.

But there are a considerable number of representa-
tive species, and an equal number of forms peculiar
to these older tertiary strata of America.

Chap. IX. MALARIA IN SOUTH CAROLINA.

179

The Ostrea sellceformisj which may be considered
as representing the O. Jlabellula of the Paris and
London basins, appears to be one of the most cha-
racteristic and widely disseminated Eocene shells in
Virginia, South Carolina, and Georgia, for I found
it at Shell Bluff and on the Santee river, and the
James river, in Virginia.

On the banks of the Cooper river, we heard occa-
sionally the melodious and liquid note of the mocking-
bird in the woods. It is of a fearless disposition,
and approaches very near to the houses. I can
well imagine that in summer, when the leaves are out,
and the flowers in full splendour, this region must
be most beautiful. But it is then that the planters are
compelled by the fever and ague to abandon their
country seats. It was not sa formerly. When the
English army was camjjaigning on the Cooper and
Santee rivers in the revolutionary war, they en-
camped with impunity in places where it would
now be death to remain for a few days in the hot
season. I inquired what could have caused so great
a change, and found the phenomenon as much a
matter of controversy as the origin of the malaria in
Italy. The clearing away of the wood from large
spaces is the chief alteration in the physical con-
dition of this region in the course of the last sixty
years, whereby tlie damp and swampy grounds un-

I 6

180

MALARIA IN SOUTH CAROLINA. Chap. I X

dergo annually the process of being dried up by a
burning sun. Marshes which are overflowed by the
tide twice in every twenty-four hours near the neigh-
bouring coast, both in South Carolina and Georgia,
are perfectly healthy. Dr. Arnold remarks, in his
lioman History, that lionie was more healthy before
the drainage of the Canipagna, and when there was
more natural wood in Italy and in northern Europe
generally. In the southern States of the Union there
are no fevers in winter, at a season when there is no
large extent of damp and boggy soil exposed to a hot
sun, and undergoing desiccation.

On our way home from Charleston, by the rail-
way from Orangeburg, I observed a thin black line
of charred vegetable matter exposed in the perpendi-
cular section of the bank. The sand cast out in dig-
ging the railway had been thrown up on the original
soil, on wliich the pine forest grew ; and farther ex-
cavations had laid open the junction of the rubbish
and the soil. As geologists, we may learn from this
fact how a thin seam of vegetable matter, an inch or
two thick, is often the only monument to be looked
for of an ancient surface of dry land, on which a
luxuriant forest may have grown for thousands of
years. Even this seam of friable matter may be
washed away when the region is submerged, and,
if not, rain-water percolating freely through the

Chap. IX. CHEERFULNESS OF THE NEGROES. 181

sand may, in the course of ages, gradually carry away
the carbon.

As there were no inns in that part of South Ca-
rolina through which we passed in this short tour,
and as we were every where received liospitably by
the planters, I had many opportunities of seeing their
mode of life, and the condition of the domestic and
farm slaves. In some rich houses maize, or Indian
corn, and rice were entirely substituted for wheaten
bread. The usual style of living is that of English
country gentlemen. They have well-appointed car-
riages and horses, and Avell-trained black servants.
The conversation of the gentlemen turned chiefly on
agricultural subjects, shooting, and horse-racing. Se-
veral of the mansions were surrounded with deer-
parks.

Arriving often at a late hour at our quarters in the
evening, we heard the negroes singing loudly and
joyously in chorus after their day's work was over.
On one estate, about forty black children were
brought up daily before the windows of the planter's
liouse, and fed in sight of the family, otherwise, we
were told, the old women who have charge of them
might, in the absence of the parents, appropriate
part of their allowance to themselves. All the slaves
have some animal food daily. When they are ill, they
sometimes refuse to take medicine, except from the

182 BOASTFULNESS OF THE NEGROES. Chap. IX.

hands of the master or mistress; and it is of all tasks
the most delicate for the owners to decide when
they are really sick, and when only shamming from
indolence.

After the accounts I had read of the sufferings of
slaves, I was agreeably surprised to find them, in
general, so remarkably cheerful and light-hearted.
It is true that I saw no gangs working under over-
seers on sugar-plantations, but out of two millions
and a half of slaves in the United States, the larger
proportion are engaged in such farming occupations
and domestic services as I witnessed in Georgia and
South Carolina. I was often for days together with
negroes who served me as guides, and found them
as talkative and chatty as children, usually boasting
of their master's wealth, and their own peculiar me-
rits. At an inn in Virginia, a female slave asked us
to guess for how many dollars a year she was let out
by her owner. We named a small sum, but she told
us exultingly, that we were much under the mark,
for the landlord paid fifty dollars, or ten guineas a
year for her hire. A good-humoured butler, at another
inn in the same state, took care to tell me that his
owner got 30/. a year for him. The coloured stewardess
of a steam-ship was at great pains to tell us her value,
and how she came by the name of Queen Victoria.
When we recollect that the dollars are not their own.

CUAP. IX.

NEGRO VANITY.

183

we can hardly refrain from smiling at the childlike
simplicity with which they express their satisfaction
at the high price set on them. That price, however,
is a fair test of their intelligence and moral worth, of
which they have just reason to feel proud, and their
pride is at least free from all sordid and mercenary
considerations. We might even say that they
labour with higher motives than the whites — a
disinterested love of doing their duty. I am aware
that wfi may reflect and philosophise on this pe-
culiar and amusing form of vanity, until we per-
ceive in it the evidence of extreme social degra-
dation ; but the first impression which it made upon
my mind was very consolatory, as I found it im-
possible to feel a painful degree of commiseration for
persons so exceedingly well satisfied with themselves.
South Carolina is one of the few states where there
is a numerical preponderance of slaves. One night,
at Charleston, I went to see the guard-house, where
there is a strong guard kept constantly in arms, and
on the alert. Every citizen is obliged to serve in
person, or find a substitute ; and the maintenance of
such a force, the strict laws against importing books
relating to emancipation, and the prohibition to bring
back slaves who have been taken by their masters
into free states, show that the fears of the owner,
whether well-founded or not, are real.

184

NEGRO WEDDING.

Chap. IX.

During our stay at Charleston, wc were present at
a negro wedding, where the bride and bridegroom,
and nearly all the company, were of unmixed African
race. They were very merry. The bride and bride-
maids all dressed in white. The marriage service
performed by an episcopal clergyman. Not long
afterwards, when staying at a farm-house in North
Carolina, I happened to ask a planter if one of his
nejrroes with whom we had been conversing; was
married. He told me. Yes, he had a wife on that
estate, as well as another, her sister, on a different
property which belonged to him ; but that there was
no legal validity in the marriage ceremony. I re-
marked, that he must be mistaken, as an episcopal
minister at Charleston would not have lent himself
to the performance of a sacred rite, if it were nu-
gatory in practice, and in the eye of the law. He
replied, that he himself was a lawyer by profession,
and that no legal validity ever had been, or ought to
be, given to the marriage tic, so long as the right of
sale could separate parent and child, husband and
wife. Such separations, he said, could not always
be prevented, when slaves multiplied fast, though
they were avoided by the masters as far as possible.
He defended the custom of bringing up the children
of the same estate in common, as it was far more
humane not to cherish domestic ties amons; slaves.

Chap. IX.

INXREASE OF SLAVES.

185

On the same farm I talked with several slaves who
had been set to fell timber by task-work, and had
finished by the middle of the day. They never ap-
peared to be overworked; and the rapidity witli
Avhich they increase beyond the whites in the United
States shows that they are not in a state of dis-
comfort, oppression, and misery. Doubtless, in
the same manner as in Ireland and parts of Great
Britain, the want of education, mental culture, and
respect for themselves, favours improvident mar-
riages among the poor ; so the state of mere animal
existence of the slave, and his low moral and in-
tellectual condition, coupled with kind treatment
and all freedom from care, promote their multipli-
cation. The effect of the institution on the progress
of the whites is most injurious, and, after travelling
in the northern States, and admiring their rapid ad-
vance, it is most depressing to the spirits. There
appears to be no place in society for poor whites. If
they are rich, their slaves multiply, and from mo-
tives of kindly feeling towards retainers, and often
from false pride, they are very unwilling to sell them.
Hence they are constantly tempted to maintain a
larger establishment than is warranted by the amount
of their capital, and they often become involved in
their circumstances, and finally bankrupt. The pru-
dence, temper, and decision of character required to
manage a plantation successfully is very great. It is

180

LAWS AGAINST EDUCATION. Chap. IX.

I
I
I

notorious that tlic hardest taskmasters to the shives
are those who come from the northern free States.

I often asked myself, when in the midst of a large
plantation, what steps I would take if I had inherited
such a property from British ancestors. I thought,
first, of immediately emancii)ating all the slaves, but
I was reminded that the law humanely i^rovides, in
that case, that I should still supi)ort them, so that
I might ruin myself and family, and it would still
be a question whether those whom I had released
from bondage would be happier, or would be pre-
pared for freedom. I then proposed to begin with
education as a preliminary step. Here I was met
with the objection that, since the abolition movement
and the fanatical exertions of missionaries, severe
statutes had been enacted, making it penal to teach
slaves to read and write. I must first, therefore,
endeavour to persuade my fellow slave-holders to
repeal these laws against improving the moral and
intellectual condition of the slaves. I remarked that,
in order to overcome the apathy and reluctance of
the planters the same kind of agitation, the same
" pressure from without," might be indispensable,
which had brought about our West Indian eman-
cipation. To this my American friends replied, that
the small number of our slaves, so insignificant in
comparison to their two and a half millions, had

CuAP. IX. CONVEUSATION WITH PLANTERS.

187

made an indeiimity to the owner possible ; also that
the frre negroe-, in small islands, could always be
laid in subjection by the British fleets; and, lastly,
that En;jfland had u ri|j;ht to interfere and legislate for
her own colonies, whereas the northern States of the
Union, and foreigners, had no constitutional right to
intermeddle with the domestic concerns of the slave
States. Such intervention, by exciting the fears and
indignation of the planters, had retarded, and nmst
always be expected to retard, the i)rogress of the
cause. They also reminded me how long and ob-
stinate a struggle the Vtest Indian proprietors hud
made against the emancipationists in the British
House of Connnons; and they hinted, that if the
different islands had been directly represented in
the Lower House, and there had been Dukes of
Jamaica, Marquises of Antigua, and Earls of Bar-
badoes in the Upper House, as the slave states are
represented in Congress, the measure would never
have been carried to this day.

The more I reflected on the condition of the slaves,
and endeavoured to think on a practicable plan for
hastening the period of their liberation, the more
difficult the subject appeared to me, and the more I
felt astonished at the confidence displayed by so
many anti-slavery speakers and writers on both sides
of the Atlantic. The course pursued by these

188

ABOLITION MOVEMENT.

Chap. IX.

agitators sliows that, next to the positively wicked,
the class who arc usually called " well-meaning
persons " are the most mischievous in society. Be-
fore the year 1830, a considerable number of the
planters were in the habit of regarding slavery as a
great moral and political evil, and many of them
openly proclaimed it to be so in the Virginia debates
of 1831-2. The emancipation party was gradually
gaining ground, and not unreasonable hopes were
entertained that the States of Kentucky, Virginia,
and jVIaryland would soon fix on some future day for
the manumission of their slaves. This step had
already been taken in most of the States north of
the Potomac, and slavery was steadily retreating
southwards. From the moment that the abolition
movement began, and that missionaries were sent to
the southern States, a re-action was perceived — the
jilanters took the alarm — laws were passed against
education — the condition of the slave was worse;
and not a few of the planters, by dint of defending
their institutions against the arguments and mis-
representations of their assailants, came actually to
delude themselves into a belief that slavery was
legitimate, wise, and expedient — a positive good in
itself. There were many, indeed, who thought dif-
ferently, but who no longer dared to express their
opinions freely on the subject.

Chap. IX. CONDITION OF THE SLAVES.

189

It is natural that those planters who are of be-
nevolent dispositions, and indulgent to their slaves,
and who envy the northern proprietor, who, now
that the Indians have passed away, has the good
fortune not to share his country with another race,
should be greatly irritated when the cruelty of the
slave-holders, as a class, is held up to the reprobation
of mankind. A deep sense of injustice, and a feeling
of indignation, disinclines them to persevere in ad-
vocating the cause of emancipation. I was so much
occupied and absorbed in my scientific pursuits that
I never felt tempted to touch on this exciting
subject, and therefore, perhaps, the planters spoke
out their sentiments to me more freely. " Labour,"
they said, " is as compulsory in Europe as here ; but
in Europe they who refuse to work have the alter-
native of starvation ; here the slave who is idle has the
alternative of corporal punishment ; for, whether he
works or not, he must always be fed and clothed."
They complained to me much of the manner in
which the escape of runaway slaves was favoured in
the free States. Their innocence, they said, is
always assumed, and the cruelty and harshness of
their owners, taken for granted ; whereas the fugitives
often consist of good-for-nothing characters, who
would have been put into gaol in Europe, but who
here are left at large, because their masters are un-

ri,

190

CONDITION OF THE SLAVES. Chap. IX.

willing to lose their services by imprisonment, while
they are compelled to support them. If the same
delinquents, they say, were flying from the con-
stable in a free State, the public would sympathise
with the police and the magistrate, and if they bore
on their backs the marks of former chastisement in
gaol, the general desire to apprehend them would be
still more eager. These apologies, and their as-
surance that they found it to their interest to treat
their slaves kindly, had no effect in inducing me to
believe that, Avhere such great power is intrusted to
the owner, that power will not be frequently abused ;
but it has made me desire to see a fair statement of
the comparative statistics of crimes and punishments
in slave States and free countries. If we could
fairly estimate the misery of all offenders in the
prisons, penitentiaries, and penal settlements of some
large European province, and then deduct the same
from the sufferings of the slaves in a large southern
State of the Union, the excess alone ought, in fair-
ness, to be laid to the charge of the slave-owners.
While pointing out the evil unreservedly, we should
do the owner the justice to remember that the
system of things which we deprecate has been in-
herited by him from his British ancestors, and that
it is rarely possible or safe to bring about a great
social reform in a few years.

Chap. IX. EFFECTS OF SUDDEN EMANCIPATION. 191

Had the measure of emancipating all the slaves
been carried through as rapidly as some abolitionists
have desired, the fate of the negroes might have
been almost as deplorable as that of the aboriginal
Indians. We must never forget that the slaves have
at present a monopoly of the labour-market ; the
planters being bound to feed and clothe them, and
being unable to turn them off and take white la-
bourers in their place. The coloured population,
therefore, are protected against the free competition
of the white emigrants, with whom, if they were
once liberated, they could no longer successfully
contend. I am by no means disjiosed to assume
that the natural capacities of the negroes, who always
appeared to me to be an amiable, gentle, and inof-
fensive race, may not be equal in a moral and in-
tellectual point of view to those of the Europeans,
provided the coloured population were placed in cir-
cumstances equally favourable for their development.
But it would be visionary to expect that, under any
imaginable system, this race could at once acquire as
much energy, and become as rapidly progressive, as
the Anglo-Saxons. To inspire them with such an
aptitude for rapid advancement must be the work of
time — the result of improvement carried on through
several successive generations. Time is precisely the
condition for which the advocates of the immediate

192

DYING OUT OF SLAVERY.

Chap. IX.

■J

liberation of the blacks would never sufficiently al-
low. The great experiment now making in the
West Indies affords no parallel case, because the
climate there is far more sultry, relaxing, and trying
to Europeans, than in the southern States of the
Union ; and it is w^ell known that the West Indian
proprietors have no choice, the whites being so few
in number, that the services of the coloured race are
indispensable.

Professor Tucker, of Virginia, has endeavoured to
show, that the density of population in the slave
States will amount, in about sixty years, to fifty per-
sons in a square mile. Long before that period ar-
rives, the most productive lands will have been all
cultivated, and some of the inferior soils resorted to :
the price of labour will fall gradually as compared to
the means of subsistence, and it will, at length, be for
the interest of the masters to liberate their slaves, and
to employ the more economical and productive labour
of freemen. The same causes will then come into
operation which formerly emancipated the villeins of
western Europe, and will one day set free the serfs
of Russia. It is to be hoped, however, that the
planters will not wait for more than half a century
for such an euthanasia of the institution of slavery ;
for the increase of the coloured population in sixty
years would be a formidable evil, snce in this

Chap. IX.

ABOLITION OF SLAVERY.

193

instance they are not, like villeins and serfs, of the
same race as their masters. They cannot be fused at
once into the general mass, and become amalgamated
with the whites, for their colour still remains as the
badge of their former bondage, so that they continue,
after their fetters are removed, to form a separate
and inferior caste. How long this state of things
would last must depend on their natural capabilities,
moral, intellectual, and physical ; but if in these they
be equal to the whites, they would eventually be-
come the dominant race, since the climate of the
south, more congenial to their constitutions, would
give them a decided advantage.

A philanthropist may well be perplexed when he
desires to devise some plan of interference which may
really promote the true interests of the negro. But
the way in which the planters would best consult
their own interests appears to me very clear. They
should exhibit more patience and courage towards
the abolitionists, whose influence and numbers they
greatly over-rate, and lose no time in educating the
slaves, and encouraging private manumission to
prepare the way for general emancipation. All
seem agreed that the states most ripe for this great
reform are ]Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina,
Tennessee, Kentucky, and INIissouri. Experience

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194

ABOLITION OF SLAVERY.

Chap. IX.

has proved In the northern States that emancipation
immediately checks the increase of the coloured
population, and causes the relative number of the
whites to augment very rapidly. Every year, in
proportion as the north-western States fill up, and as
the boundary of the new settlers in the west is
removed farther and farther, beyond the Mississippi
and Missouri, the cheaper and more accessible lands
south of the Potomac will offer a more tempting
field for colonisation to the swarms of New Eng-
landers, who are averse to migrating into slave
states. Before this influx of white labourers, the
coloured race will give way, and it will require the
watchful care of the philanthropist, whether in the
north or south, to prevent them from being thrown
out of employment, and reduced to destitution.

If due exertions be made to cultivate the minds,
and protect the rights and privileges of the negroes,
and it nevertheless be found that they cannot con-
tend, when free, with white competitors, but are
superseded by them, still the cause of humanity will
have gained. The coloured people, though their
numbers remain stationary, or even diminish, may in
the mean time be happier than now, and attain to
a higher moral rank. They would, moreover, escape
the cruelty and injustice which are the invariable

Chap. IX.

ABOLITION OF SLAVERY.

105

i 'S

consequences of the exercise of irresponsible power,
especially where authority must be sometimes dele-
gated by the planter to agents of inferior education
and coarser feelings. And last, not least, emanci-
jiation would effectually put a stop to the breeding,
selling, and exporting of slaves to the sugar-growing
States of the South, where, unless the accounts we
usually read of slavery be exaggerated and distorted,
the life of the negro is shortened by severe toil and
suffering.

Had the white man never interposed to trans-
plant the negro into the New World, the most
generous asserters of tlie liberties of the coloured
race would have conceded that Africa afforded space
enough for their development. Neither in their
new country, nor in that of their origin, whether
in a condition of slavery or freedom, have they as
yet exhibited such superior qualities and virtues as
to make us anxious that additional millions of them
should multiply in the southern States of the
Uaion; still less, that they should overflow into
Texas and Mexico.

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196

WILMINGTON.

Chap. X.

CHAPTER X.

Wihnhigton^N. C. — Mount Vernon. — Return to Philadelphia. —
Reception of Mr, Dickens. — Museum and fossil human hones.
Penitentiary. — Churches. — Religious excitement. — Coloured
people of fortune. — Obstacles to their obtaining political and
social equality. — No natural antipathy between the races. —
Negro reservations.

Jan. 22. — I NOW turned my course northwards,
and, after a short voyage in a steamer from Charles-
ton, landed at Wilmington, in North Carolina.
Here I collected fossils from tertiary formations of
two ages, the Miocene marls, and an underlying
Eocene limestone, harder than that of Shell Bluff
and the Santee canal before mentioned; but con-
taining many of the same shells, corals, and teeth of
fishes. I then went by railway to South Washing-
ton, visiting several farms on the banks of the north-
east branch of Cape Fear river. Here I found
cretaceous green marls, similar to those which I had
seen 350 miles to the N. E. in New Jersey, with
belcmnites and other characteristic organic remains,
some of species not previously known.

On several of the small plantations here I found
the proprietors by no means in a thriving state.

Chap. X.

MOUNT VERNOxV.

197

evidently losing ground from year to year, and some
of tlicm talking of abandoning the exhausted soil,
and migrating with their slaves to the south-western
States. If, while large numbers of the negroes were
thus carried to the South, slavery had been abolished
in North Carolina, the black population might ere
this have been reduced considerably in numbers,
without suffering those privations to which a free
comjietition with white labourers must expose them,
wherever great facilities for emigration are not
afforded.

A railway train shooting rapidly in the dark
through the pine forests of North Carolina has a
most singular appearance, resembling a large rocket
fired horizontally, with a brilliant stream of revolving
sparks extending behind the engine for several
hundred yards, each spark being a minute particle of
wood, which, after issuing from the chimney of the
furnace, remains ignited for several seconds in the air.
Now and then these fiery particles, which are in-
visible by day, instead of lagging in the rear, find
entrance by favour of the wind through the open
windows of the car, and, while some burn holes in
the traveller's cloak, others make their way into his
eyes, causing them to smart most painfully.

From the deck of our steam-boat on the Potomac
we saw Mount Vernon, formerly the plantation of

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198

M. NICOLLET.

Chap. X.

^ i

General AVaslilngton. Instead of exhibiting, like
the farms in the northern States, a lively picture of
progress and improvement, this property was de-
scribed to me by all as worn out, and of less value
now than in the days of its illustrious owner. The
bears and wolves, they say, are actually re-entering
their ancient haunts, which would scarcely have
happened if slavery had been abolished in Virginia,

At Petersburg, Mr. Kuffin, the agriculturist, and
Mr. Tuomey, accompanied me in an excursion to col-
lect tertiary fossils in the neighbourhood, and I
examined with much instruction the organic remains
in their cabinets. At Washington I saw M. Nicollet,
and had a long conversation with this eminent astro-
nomer and naturalist, who died the year after. He
had just returned froui a geographical and geological
survey of the Far West, and higher parts of the
valley of the Mississippi and Missouri. He showed
me the ammonites, baculites, and other chalk fossils
brought by him from those distant regions, which
establish the wide range of that peculiar assemblage
of organic remains characteristic of the cretaceous
era.

The air was balmy on the Potomac the last day of
January, and the winter had been so mild in the
southern States, that we were surprised, on recrossing
the Susquehanna at Havre de Grace in Maryland, to

Chap. X.

nilLADELl'IIIA.

109

sec large masses of floating ice brought do i from
the Appalachian hills, and to feci the air -tnsibl}
cooled while we were ferried over the broad river.
It struck me as a curious coincidence, and one not
entirely accidental, that, precisely in this part of our
journey, I once more saw the low grounds covered
with huge boulders, reminding me how vast a ter-
ritory in the South I had passed over without encoun-
tering a single erratic block. These far transported
fragments of rock are decidedly a northern pheno-
menon, or belong to the colder latitudes of the
globe, being rare and exceptional in warmer regions.
Philadelphia, Feb. 1. — The newspapers are filled
with accounts of the enthusiastic reception which
Mr. Charles Dickens is meeting with every where.
Such homage has never been paid to any foreigner
since Lafayette visited the States. The honours may
appear extravagant, but it is in the nature of popular
enthusiasm to run into excess. I find that several of
my American friends are less disposed than I am to
sympathise with the movement, regarding it as more
akin to lion-hunting than hero-worship. They ex-
press a doubt whether "Walter Scott, had he visited
the U. S., would have been so much idolised.
Perhaps not ; for Scott's poems and romances were
less extensively circulated amongst the millions than
the tales of Dickens. There may be no precedent in

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200

RECEPTION OF MR. DICKENS. CuAP. X.

I V.

I \

Great Britain for a whole people thus unreservedly
indulging their feelings of admiration for a favourite
author ; but if so, the Americans deserve the more
credit for obeying their warm impulses. Of course,
many who attend the foreigner's crowded levee are
merely gratifying a vulgar curiosity by staring at an
object of notoriety ; but none but a very intelligent
population could be thus carried away to flatter and
applaud a man who has neither rank, wealth, nor
power, who is not a militaiy hero or a celebrated
political character, but simply a writer of genius,
whose pictures of men and manners, and whose
works of fiction, have been here, as in his own coun-
try, an inexhaustible source of interest and amuse-
ment.

When at Philadelphia I was present at several
meetings of the American Philosophical Society, and
of the Academy of Natural Sciences. In the mu-
seum of the former body I was shown a limestone
from Santas, in Brazil, procured by Captain Elliott,
of the U. S. navy, which contains a human skull,
teeth, and other bones, together with fragments
of shells, some of them retaining a portion of their
colour. The rock is less solid than that of Guada-
loupe, which it resembles. We are informed, that the
remains of several hundred other human skeletons,
imbedded in a like calcareous tufa, were dug out at

Chap. X. SKELETON OF FOSSIL MASTODON.

201

the same place, about the year 1827.* The soil
coverhig the solid stone supported a growth of large
trees, which covered the face of a hill on the side of
the river Santas. The height above the sea is not
mentioned, and it is to be regretted that the notes
obtained by Dr. Meigs from Captain Elliott were
not fuller. I observed serpula) in the rock, a shell
which the natives would not have carried inland for
food. On the wdiole, therefore, I should infer, though
we need further evidence, that this stone has emerged
from the sea, and that there had been previously a
submergence of dry land, perhaps the site of an
Indian burial-ground.

Dr. Harlan, the zealous and accomplished osteo-
logist, who, to my great regret, died the year after
(1843), at New Orleans, took me to see the entire
skeleton of the large fossil mastodon, or so-called
Missourium, brought by Mr. Koch from the state of
Missouri. He pointed out several errors in the
manner in which the tusks and bones were put to-
gether. This splendid fossil has since been pur-
chased by the British Museum, taken to pieces in
London, and correctly set up again under the di-
rection of Mr. Owen. It is the largest individual of
the species (^Mastodon giganteus) yet discovered ; for

* American Philosophical Transactions, 1828, p. 285.

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202 FRESH-WATER SHELLS OF AMERICA. Chap. X,

Dr. Harlan and I compared the femur with that of
the largest mastodon previously known, from the state
of New York, and preserved in Peale's Museum in
this city. The dimensions of the Philadelphia ske-
leton are less gigantic.

I spent six weeks very agreeably in this city, much
of my time being occupied in delivering a short
course of lectures on geology, and in comparing,
with the friendly aid of several naturalists, especially
Mr. Conrad, the fossils collected by me in the South
with those previously known, most of which are pre-
served in the public and private cabinets here. Mr.
Lea's collection of shells, which we visited more
than once, rich in the fluviatile species of North
America, was most interesting to me. There seems
no end to the freshwater mussels of the genus
Unio, as well as other fluviatile forms, such as Me-
lania, which have been created to people the waters
of a continent unrivalled in the number of its rivers,
all so copiously filled with water during every sea-
son of the year. Such an obvious relation of the
zoological to the geographical peculiarities of a great
region is striking, and reminds the geologist of the
different states of the animal creation, which have
accompanied the successive changes of the earth's
surface in former ages. The same species of Cnio,
and of other fresh-water shells, preserved in a fossil

■^1

Chap. X. rHILADELPIIIA PENITENTIARY.

203

state in alluvial strata, forming terraces one above
the other to a considerable height above the Mis-
sissippi and its tributaries, show that the fauna here
alluded to, so modern in the earth's history, is never-
theless of high antiquity, and has outlasted some
important modifications in the shape of the valleys
and levels of the North American streams.

We were taken to see the Penitentiary at
Philadelphia, where all the prisoners arc confined
in separate cells. They see the keepers, chaplain,
and occasional visiters, by which the rigour of their
solitude is mitigated. They are taught to read, and
have numerous occupations. If we recollect that
this establishment is not an asylum for the poor,
aged, and destitute, like our workhouses, but a place
for the punishment and reform of criminals, we may
regard it as a humane institution, and it appeared to
me admirably managed.

A few years ago, an American professor being
asked at the end of a short stay in London whether
he had been pleased with his reception, said he had
been often invited out to dinner, but no one during
his whole stay had offered him a seat in their pew
in church. At Philadelphia, besides other kinds of
Iiospitality, we had certainly no reason to complain
of any want of attention in this respect, for we had
pressing invitations to private pews in no less than

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204

CHURCHES.

ClIAP. X.

i i

six different episcopal churches soon after our
arrival, of which we availed ourselves on as many
successive Sundays, and were struck with the
handsome style of the buildings, and the comfortable
fitting up of the pews. In regard to the preaching
in these and in most of the Episcopalian, Presby-
terian, Baptist, and Unitarian churches which I
entered in the United States, I thought it good,
and there seemed to me to be two great advantages
at least in the voluntary principle: first, that the
ministers are in no danger of going to sleep; and,
secondly, that they concern themselves much less
with politics than is the case with us. To be without
a body of dissenters, dissatisfied with their exclusion
from ecclesiastical endowments, is a national blessing,
which not only every statesman, but every church-
man, will admit. I am by no means prepared to
say whether there may not be a balance of evil in
the voluntary system sufficient to outweigh the
gain alluded to. While here, I heard complaints
of the religious excitement into which the city had
been just thrown by the arrival of a popular New
England preacher, who attracted such crowds that
at length all the sittings of his church were mo-
nopolized by the fair sex. American gallantry
forbids that a woman should remain standing while
gentlemen are comfortably seated in their pews, so

Chap. X.

EELIGIOUS EXCITEMENT.

2^5

that at last the men were totally excluded. Notice
was immediately given that certain services were
to be entirely reserved for the men, an announcement
well calculated to provoke curiosity, and to tempt
many a stray sheep from other folds. It was then
thought expedient for the ministers of rival sects
to redouble their zeal, that they might not be left
behind in the race, and even the sober Episcopalians,
though highly disapproving of the movement,
increased the number of their services; so that I
was assured it would be possible for the same
individual between the hours of seven o'clock in the
morning and nine in the evening, to go seven times
to church in one day. The consequences are too
like those occasionally experienced in the " old
country," where enthusiasm is not kindled by so much
^;ee competition, to be worth dwelling upon. Every
day added new recruits to a host of ascetic devotees,
and places of public amusement were nearly deserted ;
at last even the innocent indulgence of social
intercourse was not deemed blameless ; and the men
who had generally escaped the contagion in the midst
of their professional avocations, found a gloom cast
over society or over their domestic circle. The
young ladies, in particular, having abundance of
leisure, were filled with a lively sense of their own

1
1.

206

EPISCOPAL CHURCHES.

CUAP. X.

exceeding wickedness, and the sins of their parents
and guardians.

Many of the most respectable Quaker families
have recently joined the Episcopal church, which
is very flourishing here, not only in this city, but
in the United States generally, having quadrupled
its numbers in a period during which the population
of the Union has only doubled. It is tru^i that
immediately after the revolutionary war, when this
form of worship was identified with royalist opinions,
and when not a few of its professors left the country
for Canada, Nova Scotia, or the mother country,
the Episcopal establishment was depressed below its
natural level. Its revival and rapid progress are
nevertheless remarkable in this republican country,
and are perhaps partly owing to the possession of
large endowments, especially in the State of New
York, rendering it less dependent on voluntary
contributions, and partly to the better station of
the foreign immigrants from Great Britain belonging
to the Anglican church.

r am assured, that if the salaries paid to the
whole clergy of all sects in the Union are compared
to those of the ministers of any other church in the
world they will be found to be in excess in pro-
portion to the population. Whether this be true
or not, there is certainly no lack of divinity schools.

Chap. X.

RICH MAN OF COLOUR.

207

nor of ecclesiastical buildings, nor of crowded congre-
gations, the men being as regular in their attendance
as the women; and the rapidity with which new
churches spring up in the wilderness is probably
without example elsewhere.

A rare event, the death of a wealthy man of colour,
took place during my stay here, and his funeral was
attended not only by a crowd of persons of his own
race, but also by many highly respectable white mer-
chants, by whom he was held in high esteem. He had
made his fortune as a sail-maker, and is said to have
been Avorth, at one time, sixty thousand pounds, but
to have lost a great part of his riches by lending
money with more generosity than prudence. I was
rejoicing that his colour had proved no impediment to
his rising in the world, and that he had been allowed
so much fair play as to succeed in over-topping the
majority of his white competitors, when I learnt, on
further inquiry, that, after giving an excellent edu-
cation to his children, he had been made unhappy, by
finding they must continue, in spite of all their ad-
vantages, to belong to an inferior caste. It appeared
that, not long before his death, he had been especially
mortified, because two of his sons had been refused a
hearing at a public meeting, where they wished to
speak on some subject connected with trade which
concerned them.

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208

FREE MEX OF COLOUR.

Chap. X.

In many states, the free blacks have votes, and
exert their privilege at elections, yet there is not an
instance of a single man of colour, although eligible
by law, having been chosen a member of any state
legislature. The schools for the coloured population
at Boston are well managed, and the black children
are said to show as much quickness in learning as
the whites. To what extent their faculties might be
developed as adults we have as yet no means of
judging ; for if their first efforts are coldly received, or
treated with worse than indifference, as in the case of
the young Philadelphians before alluded to, it is im-
possible that the higher kinds of excellence can be
reached in literature, the learned professions, or in
a political career. If any individual be gifted with
finer genius than the rest, his mind will be the more
sensitive to discouragement, especially when it pro-
ceeds from a race whose real superiority over his co-
loured fellow-citizens, in their present condition, he
of all others would be the first to appreciate. It is
after many trials attended with success, and followed
by willing praise and applause, that self-confidence
and intellectual power are slowly acquired ; and no
well educated black has ever yet had an opportunity
of ripening or displaying superior talents in this or any
other civilised country. Canada and Ireland teach us
how much time and how many generations are re-

Chip. X. DErilESSIOX OF NEGKO RACE.

209

! i

quired for the blending together, on terms of perfect
equality, both social and political, of two nations, the
conquerors and the conquered, even where both are of
the same race, and decidedly equal in their natural
capacities, though differing in religion, manners, and
language. But when, in the same community, we
have two races so distinct in their physical peculiari-
ties as to cause many naturalists, who have no desire
to disparage the negro, to doubt whether both are of
the same species, and started originally from the same
stock ; when one of these, found in Africa in a savage
and unprogressive state, has been degraded, by those
who first colonized North America, to the lowest
place in the social scale — to expect, under such a
combination of depressing circumstances, that, in half
a century, and in a country where more than six
sevenths of the race are still held in bondage, the
newly emancipated citizens should, under any form of
government, attain at once a position of real equality,
is a dream of the visionary philanthropist, whose
impracticable schemes are more likely to injure than
to forward a great cause.

In the West Indies, where circumstances are far
more favourable to a fair experiment, we have found
how much easier it is to put an end to slavery than
to elevate the blacks to an equal standing with the
whites in society, and in the management of public

210

FREE MEN OF COLOUR.

Chap. X.

1,1
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lit

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affiiirs. They arc however advancing slowly ; and,
although we hear complaints of commercial losses,
consequent on emancipation, and of exports of sugar
and coffee falling off, there seems little doubt that the
negro population, comprising the great bulk of the
inhabitants, are better informed, better clothed, and
happier, in their own way, than during the period
when all were slaves. A gradual transfer of land is
going on in Barbadoes, Jamaica, and other large
islands, from the original proprietors to the negroes,
who are abandoning the cultivation of sugar, and
raising such crops and fruits of the earth as they can
obtain with moderate labour. There has not been
time to ascertain whether the freed men will ever have
aspirations after that higher civilization, which dis-
tinguishes a few of the more advanced among the
nations of western Europe ; but this problem has still
to be solved with regard to the Chinese and many
other large sections of the human family.

The near approach to universal suffrage in the
United States appears to me one of the most serious
obstacles, both to the disfranchisement of the slaves
in the South, and to their obtaining, when freed, a
proper station relatively to the whites. Wherever
property confers the right of voting, the men of
colour can at once be admitted without danger to an
absolute equality of political rights, the more in-

Chap. X.

FREE MEN OF COLOUR.

211

dustrious alone becoming invested with privileges
which arc withheld from the indigent and most
worthless of the dominant race. Such a recognition
of rights not only raises the negroes in their opinion
of themselves, but, what is of far more consequence,
accustoms a portion of the other race to respect them.
In the free states, we were often painfully reminded of
the wide chasm which now separates the whites from
the emancipated man of colour.

If there be any place where distinctions of birth,
wealth, station, and race should be forgotten, it
is the temple where the Christian precept is incul-
cated that all men are equal before God. On one
occasion in New England, when we were attending
the administration of the sacrament in an Epis-
copal church, we saw all the white communicants
first come forward, and again retire to their pews,
before any of the coloured people advanced, most of
whom were as well dressed as ourselves, and some
only a shade darker in complexion. In another
Episcopal church in New York, the order and sanctity
of the service was, for a moment, in danger of being
disturbed because some of the whites had been
accidentally omitted, so that they came to the altar
after the coloured communicants. After a slight
confusion, however, our feelings were relieved by
the officiating minister proceeding and showing his
resolution not to allow any interruption from this

212

DEPRESSED CONDITION OF

Chap. X.

accident. I had no opportunity of witnessing tlie
good example said to be set by the Roman Catholic
clergy in prohibiting all invidious distinctions in
their churches ; but we know in Europe how much
more the poor and the rich are mingled together
indifferently in the performance of their devotions in
Romanist churches than in most of the Anglo-pro-
testant congregations.

The extent to which the Americans carry their
repugnance to all association with the coloured race
on equal terms remained to the last an enigma to
me. They feel, for example, an insurmountable
objection to sit down to the same table with a well-
dressed, well-informed, and well-educated man of
colour, while the same persons would freely welcome
one of their own race of meaner capacity and ruder
manners to boon companionship. I have no doubt
that if I remained here for some years I should
imbibe the same feelings, and sympathise with what
now appears to me an almost incomprehensible pre-
judice. If the repugnance arose from any physical
causes, any natural antipathy of race, we should not
see the rich Southerners employing black slaves to
wait on their persons, prepare their food, nurse and
suckle their white children, and live with them as
mistresses. We should never see the black lady's
maid sitting in the same carriage with her mistress.

Chap. X.

FREE MEX OF COLOUR.

213

and Bupporting her Avhen fatigued, and last, though
not least, wc should not meet with a numerous
mixed breed springing up every where from the
union of the two races.

We must seek then for other causes of so general
and powerful a nature as to be capable of influencing
almost equally the opinions of thirteen millions of
men. We well know that the abolition of villeinage
and serfdom has never enabled the immediate de-
scendants of freed-men, however rich, talented, and
individually meritorious, to intermarry and be re-
ceived on a footing of perfect equality with the best
families of their country, or with that class on which
their fathers were recently dependent. If in Europe
there had been some indelible mark of ancestral
degradation, some livery, handed down indefinitely
from one generation to another, like the colour of the
African, there is no saying how long the moat galling
disabilities of the villein would have survived the
total abolition by law of personal servitude. But,
fortunately, in Western Europe, the slaves belonged
to the same race as their masters, whereas, in the
United States, the negro cannot throw off the livery
which betrays to the remotest posterity the low
condition of his forefathers.

There are Indian reservations, and I often asked
why there should not be also negro reservations, or

)

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NLGRO RESERVATIONS.

Chap. X.

large territories set apart for free blacks, where they
might form independent states or communities. It
would be proper to select those districts where the
climate is insalubrious to Europeans, but where the
blacks are i)erfcctly healthy. I was assured that no
scheme could be more Utopian — that the negroes,
if left to themselves, would abandon the cultivation
of sugar, cotton, and all the crops most appropriate
to such lands. All this I can conceive; but my friends
went on to object that the negroes would soon
sink into savage life, and make marauding expeditions
beyond their frontier. I have no doubt that if the
two parties were left without a powerful check, some
attempt would soon be made at territorial encroach-
ments, but it is easy to foresee which party would bo
the formidable aggressor.

Chap. XI.

rillLADELnilA.

215

CHAPTER XL

Philadelphia. — Financial crisis. — Pat/nient of Stale dividends
suspended. — General distress and private losses of the Ame-
ricans. — Debt of Pennsijlvaniu. — Public works. — Direct
taxes. — Deficient revenue. — Bad faith and confiscation. —
Irresponsible executive. — Loan refused by European capi-
talists in 1842. — Good faith of Congress during the war of
1812-14. — Effects of universal suffrage. — Fraudulent voting.
— Aliens. — Solvency and good faith of the majority of the
States. — Confidence of American capitalists. — Reform, of
the electoral body. — General progress of society., and prospects
of the r ^public.

Philadelphia^ January to March, 1842. — Wishing
to borrow some books at a circulating library, I
presented several dollar notes as a deposit. At
home there might have been a ringing of coin upon
the counter, to ascertain whether it was true or coun«
terfeit ; here the shop woman referred to a small
pamphlet, re-edited " semi-monthly," called a " De-
tector," and containing an interminable list of banks
in all parts of the Union, with information as to
their present condition, whether solvent or not, and
whetlier paying i^n specie, and adding a description
of " spurious note^." After a slight hesitation, the
perplexed librarian shook her head, and declaring
her belief that my notes were as good as any others.

216

FINANCIAL CRISIS.

Chap. XI.

Ill

I! I

said, if I would promise to take them back again on
my return, and pay her in cash, I might have the
volumes.

It often happened that when we offered to buy
articles of small value in shops, or fruit in the
market, the venders declined to have any dealings
with us, unless we paid in specie. They remarked
that their change might in a few days be worth
more than our paper. Many farmers and gardeners
are ceasing to bring their produce to market, although
the crops are very abundant, and prices are rising
higher and higher, as if the city was besieged. My
American friends, anxious that I should not be a
loser, examined all my dollar notes, and persuaded
me, before I set out on my travels, to convert them
into gold, at a discount of eight per cent. In less
than four weeks after this transaction, there was a
general return to cash payments, and the four banks
by which the greater part of my paper had been
issued, all failed.

A parallel might perhaps be found for a crash
of this kind in the commercial and financial history
of England, or at least in sonic of her colonies,
Australia, for example, where the unbounded facility
afforded to a new country of borrowing the super-
abundant capital of an old one, has caused a sudden
rise in the value of lands, houses, and goods, and

r !

Chap. XI.

FINANCIAL CRISIS.

217

promoted the maddest speculations. But an event
now occurred of a different and far more serious
nature. One morning we were told that the
Governor of Pennsylvania had come in great haste
from Harrisburg, in consequence of tl 3 stoppage of
one of the banks in the city, in whicli were lodged
the funds intended for the payment of dividends on
state bonds, due in a few days. On tliis emergency
he endeavoured to persuade other banks to advance
the money, but in vain ; such was the general alarm,
and feeling of insecurity. The consequent necessity
of a delay of payment was announced, and many
native holders of stock expressed to me their fears,
that although they might obtain the dividend then
actually due, it might be long before they received
another. At the same time they declared their
conviction, that the resources of the State, if well
managed, were ample; and that, if it depended
on the more affluent merchants of Philadelphia, and
the richer portion of the middle class generally,
to impose and pay the taxes, the honour of Penn-
sylvania would not be compromised.

It was painful to witness the ruin and distress
occasioned by this last blow, following, as it did, so
many previous disasters. Men advanced in years,
and retired from active life, after success in business,
or at the bar, or after military service, too old to

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218

DEBT OF TENNSYLVANIA.

Chap. XI.

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migrate with their families to the West, and begin
the world again, arc left destitute; many widows
and single women have lost their all, and great
mmibers of the poorer classes are deprived of
their savings. An erroneous notion prevails in
England that the misery created by these bank-
ruptcies is confined chiefly to foreigners, but, in fact,
many of the poorest citizens of Pennsylvania, and
of other States, had invested money in these securities.
In 1844, or two years after my stay in Philadelphia,
the Savings' Bank of New York presented a petition
to the legislature at Harrisburg for a resumption
of payment of dividends, in which it was stated that
their bank then held 300,000 dollars, and had held
800,000, but was obliged to sell 500,000 at a
great depreciation, in order to pay the claimants,
who were compelled by the distress of the times to
withdraw their deposits.

The debt of Pennsylvania amounted to about
8,000,000/. sterling, nearly two thirds of which
was held by British owners ; and as a majority of
these belonged to that party which always indulged
the most sanguine hopes of the prospects of the
American republic, and estimated most highly the
private worth of the people and their capacity for
self-government, they suffered doubly, being dis-
appointed alike in their pecuniary speculations and

Chap. XI.

DEBT OF PENNSYLVANIA^

219

begin

their political views. It was natural, therefore,
that a re-action of feeling should embitter their minds,
and incline them to magnify and exaggerate the
iniquity of that conduct which had at once impugned
the soundness of their judgment, and inflicted a
severe injury on their fortunes. Hence, not a few
of them, confounding together the different States,
have represented all the Americans as little better
than swindlers, who, having defrauded Europe of
many millions sterling, were enjoying tranquilly and
with impunity the fruits of their knavery. The
public works executed with foreign capital are
supposed by many in England to yield a large profit
on the outlay, which is not the case in any one of
the delinquent States.

The loss or temporary suspension of the interest
even of one third of the above-mentioned debt,
in a country like Pennsylvania, where there is a
small amount of capital to invest, and that belonging
chiefly to persons incapable of exerting themselves
to make money, a country where property is so
much divided, and where such extensive failures
had preceded this crisis, inflicts a far deeper wound
on the happiness of the community, than the de-
falcation of a much larger sum in Great Britain
would occasion.

When we inquire into the circumstances which have

L 2

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220

PUBLIC WORKS.

Chap. XL

involved the Pennsylvanians In their present difficul-
ties, we shall find that, disgraceful as their conduct has
been, their iniquity is neither so great, nor the pros-
pect of their affairs righting themselves so desperate,
as might at first sight be supposed. Every holder
of Pennsylvanian bonds is undoubtedly entitled to
assume that " there's something rotten in the state
of Denmark," and to observe to any traveller who
extenuates the delinquency of the State, " the better
you think of the people, the worse opinion you must
entertain of their institutions." How, under a repre-
sentative form of government, can such events occur
in time of peace, and, moreover, in a state so wealthy,
that an income tax of 13^ per cent would yield
the two millions of dollars required*, and where the
interest on the bonds was not usurious nor unusual
in America — unless the majority of the electors
be corrupt or grossly ignorant ?

It appears that in the year 1831, when Pennsyl-
vania borrowed a large sum for making railways
and canals, she imposed direct taxes for seven years,
for the express purpose of regularly paying the
interest of her debt. It was hoped, from the
experience of New York, that, at the expiration of
that term of years, the public works would become
sufficiently profitable to render it unnecessary to
* Tucker's Progress of the U. S. 1843. p. 210.

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Chap. XI.

DIRECT .TAXES.

221

renew the tax. The inhabitants went on paying
until the year 1836, when the government thought
itself justified in remitting the burden, on being
unexpectedly enriched by several large sums from
various sources. In that year they received for
granting a charter to the U. S. Bank of Pennsyl-
vania 2,600,000 dollars, and 2,800,000 more for
their share of monies which had accumulated in the
treasury of the Federal Government, arising out of
the sale of public lands, and then divided among the
States. It was calculated that these funds would last
for three years, and that the public works would
by that time yield a revenue sufficient to defray
the interest of the sum laid out on executing them.

That the legislature should have seized the first
opportunity of relieving their constituents from the
direct taxes will astonish no one who has perused the
printed paper of the tax-assessor in Pennsylvania,
which every one is required to fill up. The
necessity of ascertaining the means of persons
possessed of small property renders the questions
exceedingly minute and inquisitorial. From a
variety of others, I extract the following: — *^ What
is the amount of your monies loaned on mortgage,
and the debts due to you by solvent debtors?"
" What interest do they pay?" "What shares do
you hold in any bank or company in any other State?"

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222

OVER-TRADIXG.

Chap. XI.

" How many pleasure carriages do you keep ? "
" How many watches do you own? — are they gold
or silver?" and so forth.

Soon after the ill-judged remission of this tax,
a great combination of circumstances led to over-
trading, and the most extravagant schemes of money-
making. The United States' Bank, during its
controversy with President Jackson, had accumulated
a large amount of specie, and lent it out most
lavishly and imprudently; and when it obtained
its new charter from Pennsylvania, it again promoted
loans of all kinds, which gave an inordinate stimulus
to speculation. Some of the great London banks,
at the same time, gave credit to a prodigious amount,
often without sufficient caution; and "when they
were compelled to withdraw this credit suddenly,
they had not time to distinguish which of their
creditors were worthy of confidence. A great fire
in New York, in 1834, had annihilated property to
the value of six millions sterling. After the United
States' Bank had ceased to be connected with the
Federal Government, many other States, besides
Pennsylvania, granted charters to banks, which led to
an over-issue of notes, and a hot-bed forcing of trade
throughout the Union. Then came, in 1839, the
miserable expedient of authorizing banks to suspend
cash payments, and in 1841, the stoppage of the

Chap. XI. NON-rAYMENT OF DIVIDENDS.

223

great U. S. Bank of Pennsylvania, followed by a
general panic and financial crisis.

It is necessary to reflect on these events, in
order to understand how the insolvency of Penn-
sylvania was brought about; but no American
writer or statesman of any character pretends to
excuse or palliate the conduct of her legislature
in 1839, 1840, and 1841. In these years, there was
an actual excess in the ordinary expenditure of the
State for the purposes of government and education,
over the receipts from all sources of revenue, ex-
cept the public works. The proceeds of these last
were appropriated to the payment of the interest of
the debt, for which they were lamentably insufficient.
In what manner were these various deficits provided
for ? Not by the imposition of new burdens, but by
borrowing, and adding annually to the public debt.
The party in power shrank from the unpopularity of
laying on new taxes ; and the slight share of discredit
incurred by them at the time, for this glaring act of
bad faith, places in a strong light the mischief arising
from the small power here confided to the executive.

The Governor tells the Houses that there is a defi-
ciency in the revenue, and they are left to make the
best of it, and appoint a committee of ways and means,
composed usually of members very incompetent as
financiers. It is for them to consider what is to be

L 4

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NON-PAYMENT OF DIVIDENDS. Chap. XL

done ; there is no experienced official Minister of
Finance, no chancellor of the exchequer, whose duty
it is to come forward with a budget, and declare, like
the English minister in 1842 : — " Here is an income-
tax, to which you must submit, or we resign." The
jealousy on the part of the people, and their fears of
the abuses of a strong executive, have induced them
to circumscribe its powers so much, that they have
virtually deprived it of all responsibility. In their
attempt to avoid one evil, they have fallen into
another as great, if not greater.

The resources of the country were so paralyzed in
1842, amidst the general wreck, and crash of commer-
cial houses and banks, that the suspension of the pay-
ment of one or two State dividends had become
unavoidable ; but the non-payment even of a fraction
of the interest in 1843-4, during a period of reviving
prosperity and sound currency, reflects no small dis-
grace on the people, or discredit on the nature of
their institutions.

It appears that in the year 1841, before the
regular payment of dividends was suspended, a
new property tax was imposed, which came into play
in 1842, and yielded to the State 486,000 dollars ;
and 558,000 more in 1843, and an additional sum in
1844, of 755,000 dollars. These returns being inade-
quate, a new tax was laid on in 1844, with more
stringent regulations for enforcing its collection, and

Chap. XI.

CAUSES OF DEFALCATION.

225

it is now expected (December, 1844) that the public
creditor, whose arrears of unpaid dividends have, in
the mean time, been funded, will receive his due.
But how many bondholders have been already obliged
to sell out, while others are dead and gone, so that
restitution to all becomes impossible ; and thus, to a
certain extent, an irretrievable act of confiscation has
been perpetrated !

Let us now consider how far these evils can be
attributed to causes of so general, lasting, and deep-
seated a nature, as to have justified the monied men
of England and the Continent, in 1842, in the dis-
trust manifested by them of the good faith of the whole
Union. Such a want of confidence was displayed
when the agent of the Federal Government failed
to obtain in Europe a loan of a few millions sterling
offered on very advantageous terms.

On referring to the history of the United States,
during the present century, we find that in the course
of the war of 1812 — 1814, the nation had incurred a
debt about equal to that now owing (1844) by all
the delinquent States. A proposal was twice made
in Congress to discontinue the payment of dividends
to the English creditors, on the ground that they
were enemies. On both occasions, the proposal was
rejected, as dishonest, and with marked expressions
of disapi)robation; at a time when direct taxes levied by

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226

CAUSES OF DEFALCATION.

Chap. XI.

the Federal Government pressed heavy on the people.
The debt went on increasing after the close of the war,
but was at length entirely paid off in 1835. These
transactions raised the character of American secu-
rities throughout Europe ; and the altered tone of
feeling evinced in 1842 is the more remarkable,
as it occurred in a time of profound peace, when
there was no immediate anticipation of war, and
when it was well known that between the years
1812 and 1842, the wealth and territory of the
confederacy had increased enormously, and the popu-
lation more than doubled. In fact, the advance in
the number of the inhabitants in this short interval
was from eight to eighteen millions ; the excess alone
amounting to more than the population of all England
at the commencement of the present century.

It cannot be denied that the course of events
during the thirty years above alluded to lias afforded
grounds of anxiety to those who admire republican
institutions and to every well-wisher of the prosperity
of the Union. They who would make a permanent in-
vestment of money in U. S. stock must anticipate the
possibility of war, and of a consequent reduction of
revenue from the customs. If it then became necessary
to lay on direct taxes, we have to consider, whether a
majority of all the citizens would be likely to evince as
much repugnance to pay their dividends punctually to

mi%

CUAP. XI.

UNIVERSAL SUFFllAGE.

227

foreign and domestic creditors as the Pennsylvanians
and IVIarylandcrs have recently shown. If it has
required several years to rouse the electors of these
ancient States to a sense of their duty and honour,
would the consciences of the new settlers in ruder
and less advanced communities, constituting a large
portion of the Union, be more sensitive ?

As politicians, no people are so prone to give way
to groundless fears and despondency respecting the
prospects of affairs in America as the English, partly
because they know little of the condition of society
there, and partly from their own well-founded convic-
tion, that a near approach to univei»al suffrage at home
would lead to anarchy and insecurity of property.
To divide the land equally among all, to make an
" equitable adjustment" of the national debt, or, in
other words, to repudiate, are propositions gravely dis-
cussed at Chartist meetings, and even embodied in nu-
merously signed petitions to parliament. The majority
even of the democratic party in the U. S. would
probably assent to the opinion, that in England,
where there is so much actual want, where one tenth
of the population, or 1,500,000 persons, receive pa-
rochial relief, where education has made such slow
progress among the poor, and where there is no out-
let in the Far West, no safety-valve for the escape
of the redundant inhabitants, it would be most dan-

L 6

228

UNIVERSAL SUFFRAGE.

CUAP. XI.

i' I

ill

gcrous to entrust every adult male with the right
of voting. Yet in America they think the experi-
ment a safe one, or even contend that it has suc-
ceeded. But not a few of the opposite party, how-
ever inexpedient and useless they may think it to
agitate the question, agree with the majority of
European politicians in considering that it has low-
ered and deteriorated the character of the electoral
body.

It is undeniable that the rapidity with which the
native population has multiplied throughout the
Union, and still more the influx of aliens into every
State, has had a tendency to cause the whole country
to resemble a new colony, rather than an old and
long-established nation. Not only many new Terri-
tories and States, but even some of the old ones,
such as New York and Pennsylvania, contain so
much unoccupied land that they arc full of adven-
turers and speculators from other parts of America,
and of new-comers from Europe, speaking diffe-
rent languages, often cherishing foreign prejudices,
and disturbing the equilibrium of native parties,
founded on broad and distinct views of home policy.
I have already remarked, that, on the southern fron-
tier of the State of New York (p. 59.), I saw the native
forest yielding as fast to the axe of the new settler, as
if we had penetrated to the Far West, or the back

Chai'. XI.

IRISH VOTERS.

229

woods of Canada. When wc turn to licr northern
confines, wc learn from the Reports of the Geological
Surveyors employed by government in 1837, and
subscfjuent years, that in Essex County and else-
where they had recourse to Indian guides in a path-
less wilderness, encountered panthers and moose-deer,
found the beaver still lingering in some streams, saw
lakes before undescribcl, and meaHurcd the height of
mountains for the first time. L'.'vlng my short so-
journ in the mctriypoll;- «'f th ...c State, I witnesjicd,
among other 'llustrM.tiops of the hetcrogoiicous com-
position of its people, a graLi Hopcui dcmonstrr.tini,
an endless procc.^Lvion oi Iiisli parading the sweets,
with portraits of O'ConnclJ emblazoned on thoir
banners, and various mottooiv implying tlint tliclr
thoughts were occupied ^vith party rp^ostioo.s oC
British, not of American poiiiicf?. A Jf^gc mr^iber
of these aliens havo^ contrary to old usage, been cf
late years invested with eicctoral rights ; and can-
didates for places in the magistracy, or tho legisla-
ture, are degraded by piiyin*? court t: their sympa-
thies and ignorant prejudices. This temptation is
too strong to be icsi&tcd; for, small as may be their
numbers whca compared with the native voters, they
ofter t;.irn the scale in an election where the great
constitutional parties are very nearly balanced.
In addition to some of these evils, Pennsylvania

230

PENXSYLVANIAN GERMANS.

Chap. XL

I T

labours under the disadvantage of being jointly occu-
pied by two races, those of British, and those of
German extraction. The latter arc spoken of by
the Anglo-Americans as the Boeotians of the land.
They appeared to me industrious and saving, very
averse to speculation, but certainly wanting in that
habit of identifying themselves with the acts of their
government, which can alone give to the electors under
a representative system a due sense of responsibility.
Some of them talked of their public works as of
commercial projects which had failed ; and when I
remarked that, unlike the English, whose debts were
incurred by carrying on wars, they were at least
reaping some advantage from their expenditure, they
assured me I was mistaken — that such cheap and
rapid means of locomotion were positively injurious,
by facilitating migrations to the West, and preventing
a country with a " sparse " population from filling up.
For this reason, their lands had not risen in value
as they ought to have done. They protested that
they had always been opposed to railways and canals ;
and that for every useful line adopted, there was
sure to be another unnecessary canal or railway made,
in consequence of " log-rolling" in their legislature.
The rerresentatives, they say, of each section of the
country, would only consent to vote money, if they
could obtain a promise that an equal sum should be

CUAP. XI.

FRAUDULENT VOTING.

231

laid out in their own district, and to this end some
new and uncalled-for scheme had to be invented.
This kind of jobbing they compare to log-rolling
in the back settlements, where the thinly-scattered
inhabitants assemble and run up a log-cabin in a
single day for the new-comer, receiving, in their
turn, some corresponding service, whenever the union
of numbers is required.

From all I could learn, I felt inclined to believe,
that as soon as these Germans were convinced that
they really owed the money they would pay it.
There are, however, a multitude of European immi-
grants who have recently been admitted to take
part in the elections by shortening the term of years
required for naturalization. It is also notoi^ious that,
owing to the neglect of registration, many aliens vote
fraudulently, and others several times over at the
same poll, in various disguises.

To those English politicians who are not accus-
tomed to look with favouring eyes or democratic
institutions in general, the task of reforming such
abuses appears hopeless. By what eloquence, they
ask, can we persuade an ignorant multitude to ab-
dicate power, if we have once taken the false step of
conferring sovereignty upon them ? At every elec-
tion they must become more and more demoralized.
It is proverbially difficult for truth to reach the ears

Hff

232

UNIVERSAL SUFFRAGE.

Chap. XT.

of kings, and what matters it wlictlier the sovereign
consist of one or of many individuals ? The flattery
of demagogues is not less gross and servile than that
of courtiers in the palaces of princes. The candi-
dates for popular favour, when appealing to the
passions of the vulgar, their vanity, pride, and na-
tional jealousy, never administer their honied drugs
in homa3opatliic doses. By what arts or powers of
oratory can we hope to persuade the least educated
portion of the community, when they have once oL-
tainetl by their numbers a preponderating influence,
that they ought to be disfranchised? — that the more
wealthy citizens, who have leisure for study and
reflection, will shrink from the ordeal of contested
elections, if they must defer to vulgar prejudices,
and coarser feelings; — in a word, that some must be
content to break stones on the road and dig canals,
instead of choosing lawgivers, and instructing them
how to vote ?

Notliing is more easy than to draw so discouraging
a picture of the dangers of universal sufli-age, that we
are led to despair of the republic, and deem it far
more wonderful that Ohio should pay than that Mis-
sissippi should repudiate. But when we take a nearer
view of recent events, and observe what is now going
on in the U. S., we discover grounds for viewing
their affairs in a very different and far more cheerful

CH.XI. CONFIDENCE OF AMERICAN CAPITALISTS. 233

light. In the first place, touching financial matters,
it is satisfactory to know that, when the Central Go-
vernment failed, in 1842, to contract a loan in Eu-
rope, the American capitalists came forward without
hesitation, and advanced the money on the terms
which had been rejected. The new stock rose at
once above par, and has since become saleable in
Europe at a premium of 16 per cent. The Ame-
ricans have, also, made large purchases, in the years
1843 and 1844, of the bonds of Ohio, Kentucky,
Tennessee, and even Pennsylvania; and had there
been more capital seeking investment in the U. S.,
their securities generally would have changed hands
to a greater extent.

This confidence is not based on any principles of
pure patriotism, but on cool calculation and a know-
ledge that all but nine out of twenty-nine States and
Territories are either free from debt, or have been
true to their engagements. The only State which
has formally disowned or repudiated a portion of
her debt, amounting to about one million sterling,
is Mississippi. She does not deny having received
the money, or a part of it, but has the effrontery to
allege, as ground for non-payment, that her agents
exceeded their powers, and defrauded her. Michigan,
also, and Florida, have held language somewhat border-
ing on repudiation ; but the other States in arrear have

234

UNIVERSAL SUFFRAGE

Chap. XI.

promised to pay, and some of them are exerting them-
selves in earnest to accomplish the object. Upon the
whole, the interest of nearly half the money borrowed
has been regularly paid ; and when we recollect that
no small part of it was lent to new and poor States or
Territories, where society is still in a rude, half-formed,
and migratory condition, and that the money lent
rashly and incautiously was spent, as might have been
expected, improvidently, we must view their delin-
quency with Gome indulgence, and assign a share, at
least, of the blame to the lender.

The state of Ohio has always punctually discharged
the interest of her debt by direct taxes imposed for
that special purpose, although there has been a de-
ficit from the beginning on the proceeds of her public
works. She is of recent origin, and her growth has
been more rank and luxuriant than that of any other
State of the Union. An influx of illiterate Irish,
"Welsh, and Westphalian settlers, has tended to lower
the educationrl qualifications of her electors, considered
as a whole ; but she came of a good New-England
stock, which, like the philosopher's stone, has con-
verted much of her baser metal into gold.

Any foreigner who has hastily embraced the notion
that a suffrage virtually universal must be incompa-
tible in the U. S. with order, obedience to the laws,
security of property, a high degree of civilization.

Chap. XI. IN THE NEW-ENGLAND STATES.

235

and the most unimpeachable public credit, has only
to make himself acquainted with the present con-
dition of the New-England States, especially Massa-
chusets, and he will feel satisfied that the charge
may be refuted. It is a wholly diiferent question
whether so democratic a constitution is equally fitted
for the exigencies of many other parts of the Union,
where the mass of the people arc less advanced in
knowledge and wealth, where the force of public
opinion and sympathy is checked, and the free com-
munication of thought impeded, by distinctness of
races and of language.

Although the political constitutions of the several
States are all formed on one great model, there exists
considerable diversity in the details of their or-
ganization. The qualifications of the electors and
legislators are not the same in all, nor the modes of
ajDpointment or powers of the Executive. There
seems, however, a nearer approach to uniformity, than
can be consistent Avitli the very different degrees of
social advancement and mental cultivation to which
these independent States have attained.

To defects and blemishes of this kind, the leading
statesmen in America are not blind, and both the
evils and their remedies are subjects of the freest
discussion. In many of the newspapers, and in the

236

GENERAL PROGRESS OF SOCIETY, Chap. XL

monthly and quarterly journals of both parties, in
public lectures and speeches at elections, we find,
during the last three years, the conduct of repu-
diating or defaulting States unsparingly condemned.
The most earnest appeals are made to the sense of
justice and honour, to the religious feelings or na-
tional pride, of their hearers or readers ; they also
tell them that it is their interest to pay, and that, if
they cannot be moved by higher motives, they should
remember that " Honesty is the best policy." The
frequency and earnestness of these exhortations suf-
ficiently prove the conviction of the writers and ora-
tors that a reform may be brought about. The
mischief that has occurred is sometimes adduced as a
proof that education and habits of temperance, al-
though they have made great progress during the
last fifteen years, have not yet been carried far enough.
A more strict registration of the electors for the sake
of putting an end to fraudulent voting, and the ex-
clusion of foreigners from the electoral body, by
lengthening the term of naturalization, are measures
warmly insisted upon by the party opposed to the
extremes of democracy — a party which, so late as the
year 1840, obtained a majority in a presidential elec-
tion, when two millions and a half of persons gave
their votes. Sanguine hopes are entertained that the

Chap. XI. AND PROSPECTS OF THE REPUBLIC. 237

most respectable members of the democratic party-
will also join in effecting reforms in the electoral sys-
tem so obviously desirable. It is not simply the fair
fame and happiness of eighteen millions of souls
which are at stake ; for during the Ufetime of thou-
sands now taking part in public affairs, or before
the close of the present century, the population of
the U. S. will probably amount, even on a moderate
estimate, to no less than eighty millions.*

Tucker's Progress of the U.S., p. 106.

238

NEW YORK.

Chap. XII.

! il

CHAPTER Xn.

i lb

New York city. — Geology. — Distribution of erratic blocks in
Long Island. — Residence in New York. — llffects on society of
increased intercourse of distant States. — Separation of the
capital and metropolis. — Climate. — Geology of the Taconic
mountains. — Stratum of plumbago and anthracite in the mica
scliist of Worcester. — Theory of its origin. — Lectures for the
working classes. — Fossil foot'prints of birds in red sandstone. —
Mount Holyoke. — Visit to the island of Martha's Vineyard. —
Fossil Walrus. — Lidians.

New York, March, 1842. — The island on which New
York stands is composed of gneiss, as are the cliiFs on
the left bank of the Hudson, for many miles above.
At Hoboken, on the opposite side of the river, cliffs
are seen of serpentine, a rock which appears to be
subordinate to the gneiss, as in many parts of Norway
and Sweden. All these formations, as well as the
syenite of Staten Island, correspond very closely with
European rocks of the same order.

Long Island is about 130 miles in length, and the
town of Brooklyn, on its western extremity, inay be
considered as a suburb of New York. This low island
is every where covered with an enormous mass of drift
or diluvium, and is the most southern point in the
United States, where I saw large erratic blocks in great

CiiAP. XII. BROOKLYX ERIIATIC BLOCKS.

239

numbers. Excavations recently made in the Navy
Yard at Brooklyn have exposed the boulder forma-
tion to the depth of thirty feet; the lowest portion
there seen consisting of red clay and loam, with
boulders of trap and sandstone, is evidently the
detritus of the Xew Red Sandstone formation of
New Jersey. This mass, in the sections where I
observed it, was about eighteen feet thick, and
rudely stratified. Above it lay an unstratified grey
loam, partly of coarse and partly of fine materials,
with boulders and angular blocks of gneiss, syenitic
greenstone, and other crystalline rocks, dispersed at
random through the loamy base, the whole being
covered with loam eiii'ht feet thick. One angular
block of gneiss, which I measured, was thirteen feet
long, by nine in breadth, and five feet high, but
masses still larger have been met with, and broken up
by gunpowder. Mr. Redfield, who accompanied me
to Brooklyn, suggested that the inferior red drift may
have been accumulated first when the red sandstone
of the neighbouring country was denuded, and that
afterwards, when the land was submerged to a greater
depth, and when the gneiss and hypogene mountains
of the highlands alone protruded above the waters, the
upper drift with its erratics may have been thrown
down. I am well disposed to adopt this view, because
it coincides with conclusions to which I was led by

u )

240

STRATIFIED DRIFT.

Chap. XII.

If;

independent evidence, after examining the districts
around Lakes Erie and Ontario, viz. that the drift
M'as deposited during the successive submergence of a
region which had been previously elevated and de-
nuded, and which had already acc[uired its present
leading geographical features and superficial configu-
ration.

At South Brooklyn, I saw a fine example of stra-
tified drift, consisting of beds of clay, sand, and
gravel, which were contorted and folded as if by
violent lateral pressure, while beds below of similar
composition, and equally flexible, remained horizontal.
These appearances, which exactly agree with those
seen in the drift of Scotland or the North of Europe,
generally accord well with the theory which attri-
butes the pressure to the stranding of ice islands, which,
when they run aground, are known to push before
them large mounds of shingle and sand, and must
often alter greatly the arrangement of strata forming
the upper part of shoals, or mud-banks and sand-
banks in the sea, while the inferior portions of the
same remain unmoved.

Mr. Mather, in his Report on the geology of this
portion of New York *, states an interesting fact in
regard to the arrangement of the boulder formation on
Long Island, which, as before mentioned, extends for

* Report for 1837, p. 88.

Chap. XII. LONG ISLAND BOULDERS.

241

about 130 miles cast and west. At its eastern ex-
tremity the boulders arc of such kinds of granite,
gneiss, mica, slate, greenstone, and syenite, as may
have come across the Sound from parts of Rhode
Island, immediately to the north. Farther westward,
opposite the mouth of the Connecticut River, they
are of such varieties of gneiss and hornblende slate
as correspond with the rocks of the region through
which that river passes. Still farther west, or opposite
Xewhaven, they consist of red sandstone and con-
glomerate, and the trap of that country ; and lastly,
at the western end, adjoining the city of New York,
we find serpentine, red sandstone, and various granitic
and crystalline rocks, which have come from the
district lying immediately to the north. This distri-
bution of the travelled fragments will remind every
geologist of the manner in which distinct sets of
erratics are lodged on the Swiss Jura, each set,
whether of granite, marble, or gneiss, answering in
composition to those parts of the Alps which are
nearest and immediately opposite, as if they had
crossed the great valley of Switzerland, more
than fifty miles broad, in a direction at right angles
to its length. The Sound, which separates Long
Island from the main land, is from five to twenty-
five miles broad. The fragments have doubtless
been transported by ice ; but we must suppose them

t '1

242

NEW YOniv.

ClIAP. XII.

[i ! I'

i'1

to have been floated by ice-islands in the sea, as
there are no high mountains in this part of North
America from which glaciers can have descended
after the continent had acquired nearly its present
shape and altitude.

We spent several weeks at New York, and soon
found ourselves at home in the society of persons
to some of whom we had letters of introduction
from near relatives in England, and others whom
we had met at distant places in the course of our
tour. So many American citizens migrate from
north to south for the sake of mild winters, or
attendance on Congress, or the supreme courts of law
at Washington, or congregate in large watering
places during the summer, or have children or brothers
settled in the Far West ; everywhere there is so much
intercourse, personal or epistolary, between scientific
and literary men in remote states, who have often
received their university education far from home,
that in each new city where we sojourn our
American friends and acquaintances seem to know
something of each other, and to belong to the same
set in society. The territorial extent and political
independence of the different States of the Union
remind the traveller rather of the distinct nations
of Europe than of the different counties of a single
kingdom like England ; but the population has spread
so fast from certain centres, especially from New

Chap. XII.

NEW YOllK.

243

Engljind, and the facilities of communication by rail-
way and ?tcam-boat arc so great, and are always
improving so rapidly, that the twenty-six republics
of 1842, having a pojiulation of seventeen millions,
are more united, and belong more thoroughly
to one nation, than did the thirteen States in 177G,
when their numbers were only three millions. In
spite of the continued decline of the federal
authority, and the occasional conflict of commercial
interests between the North and South, and the
violent passions excited by the anti-slavery move-
ment, the old colonial prejudices have been softening
down from year to year, the English language,
laws, and literature, have pervaded more and more
the Dutch, German, and French settlements, and
the danger of the dismemberment of the confederacy
appears to all reflecting politicians less imminent
now than formerly.

I dined with Mr. Astor, now far advanced in
years, whose name is well known to the readers of
Washington Irving's " Astoria." He informed me
that he was about to found a large public library
in New York, which I rejoice to hear, as the scientific
men and naturalists of this country can rarely
afford to purchase expensive European works with
numerous illustrations. I often regretted, durins:
my short residence here, that the town of Albany,

M 2

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244

VARIABLE CLIMATE.

Chap. XII.

150 miles distant, is destined, because it is the capital,
to possess the splendid collection of minerals, rocks,
and fossils obtained during the late government
survey. The surveyors are now f^mployed in arrang-
ing: these treasures in a museum, which would have
been far more useful ana more frequently con-
sulted if placed in the midst of this wealthy
metropolis, having a population of 300,000 souls.
Foreigners, indeed, who have only visited New
York for commercial purposes may imagine that
all the inhabitants are exclusively engrossed with
trade and money-making; but there is a college
here, and many large and flourishing literary and
scientific institutions. I received numeroKS invi-
tations to deliver lectures on geology, but had
scarcely time to finish one short course when I
was reminded, by the breaking uj) of winter, that
I could resume my operations in the field.

It was nov/ the second week of April, and already
the willows on " the Battery " were putting forth
their yellowish-green leaves. The air was as warm
as in an English summer, although a few days before
the ground had been covered with snow. Such
sudden changes are trying to many constitutions ;
and we are told that if we staid a second year in
the United States we should feel the influence of
the climate, and begin to lose that freshness of

Chap. XIT.

TACONIC MOUNTAIN.

245

colour wliicli marks the newly -arrived Englishman.
The greater sallowness of complexion here is attri-
buted to the want of humidity in the air; and we
oujiht to congratulate ourselves that there is no lack
of that ingredient in the atmosphere of Great
Britain. We continue to be surprised at the clear-
ness of the skies, and the number of fine days and
brlf^ht star-liffht ni"hts, on this side of the Atlantic.
April 12, 1842. — Left New York, and ascended
the North E-iver to Hudson City, to observe there
the transition or Silurian slates and limestones.
These rocks have undergone so much disturbance
that I was unable to satisfy m} iclf — perhaps from
want of more time for observation — whether the
alleged unconformability of the fossiliferous lime-
stone to the black slate is real or only apparent,
and owing to shifts in the position of the strata.
From Hudson City I followed the line of the rail-
way by Chester and Westfield, over what is called
the Taconic range of mountains. They may be
considered, geographically, as a continuation of the
Green Mountains of Vermont ; and they do not
differ greatly in their geological structure, the pre-
dominant rocks being gneiss, mica schist, talcose
slate, and crystalline limestone, the larger portion
of which would in the ordinary nomenclature of
geology be called primary. They have, however,

M 3

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ll i .?•-

24G

TACOXIC GROUP OF STRATA. Chap. XII.

been termed metamorplilc, because in some of the
associated slates traces of fucoida and vermiform
bodies, called Nereites, have been discovered. Pro-
fessors Hitchcock and II. D. Kogers have expressed
an opinion, which appeared to me highly probable
after a cursory examination of these hills, that they
consist of altered Silurian strata. Dr. Emmons, on
the other hand, contends that they are more ancient
than the lowest sandstone of the oldest fossiliferous
group of New York, — in a word, that they are
sedimentary strata of an era anterior to the Silurian,
in a metamorphic state. The order of arrangement
of the masses, their mineral constituents and organic
remains, are appealed to in support of this theory ;
and several sections are considered as proving that
the most ancient sandstones of the New York series
rc^t unconformably on the rocks in question, to
which Dr, Emmons gives the name of the Taconic
system. But the fossils are so few, and so analogous
either to species found in the Silurian strata in the
United States or in those now generally referred,
like the Nereites (a species of annelides?), to the
inferior division of that group in Great Britain, that
the claim of tliis Taconic group to an independent
place among the paleozoic formations seems still very
questionable.

I went afterwards to examine the mica schist
of "Worcester, in Massachusetts, to the east of the

Chap. XII. PLUMBAGINOUS ANTHRACITE.

247

of the
miform
Pro-
pressed
robable
it they
ons, on
ancient
liferous
icy are
Uurlan,
gement
organic
theory ;
ng that
J series
ion, to
Caconic
alogous
. in the
sferred,
to the
n, that
endent
11 very

schist
:>f the

Taconic range and of* the Connecticut Kiver, and
forty-five miles due west of Boston. I found,
interstratified with the mica schist and associated
clay-slate of this place, a regular bed of plumba-
ginous anthracite, or impure graphite, portions of
which give a streak on paper like a lead pencil.
It has been used for making pencils, while a part
of the stratum has been worked for coal, but
apparently without profit, as the mine is now
abandoned. The mica schist contains garnets and
asbestus, and is much impregnated with carbonaceous
matter. I searched in vain for vegetable impressioiiS
in the plumbaginous anthracite, which was in part
iridescent, like coal, and so much resembled some of
the earthy anthracites which I soon afterwards saw
on the borders of Massachusetts and Rhode Island,
at Wrcntham, Cumberland, Attleborough, and
Mansfield, that I feel strongly inclined to believe
that the Worcester beds, however crystalline they
may be, are no other than carboniferous rocks in an
altered or metamorphic state. At the various loca-
lities last mentioned I found in the carbonaceous
slates accompanying the anthracite the most common
coal plants, such as Pecopteris plumosa, Neuropteris
flexuosa, Sphenophyllum, Calamites, &c. Although
the associated strata were not in a crystalline con-
dition, they and the coal were occasionally traversed

M 4

248

ANTHRACITE IN MICA SCHIST. Chap. XII.

! 'r

.ii

h )

r
i
i;

with veins of quartz, like the plumbaginous bed
at Worcester ; and there are many places in Khode
Island and Massachusetts, pointed out by Dr. C. T.
Jackson and Professor Hitchcock, in which the
carboniferous and old red sandstone rocks pass into
mica schist, and other hypogene rocks, especially in
the neighbourhood of masses of granite and syenite.
In some cases the pebbles of the conglomerate
remain distinct, while the shaly base has been turned
into a well-characterised mica schist, of which I
obtained specimens.

I have already mentioned (p. 90.) that in crossing
from the west of the Alleghany mountains to the
eastern portion of the Appalachian coal-field the
volatile ingredients (oxygen, hydrogen, and nitrogen)
of the original coal bear continually a smaller and
smaller proportion to the carbon. In the specimens
which I myself obtained from Pomeroy, Ohio, where
the coal is bituminous, and where the strata are un-
disturbed, the quantity of gaseous matter has been
found by my friend Dr. Percy to be in the propor-
tion of 19 per cent., the rest being carbon and ash.
2dly. In the coal at Frostburg, in Maryland, in the
midst of the Alleghany chain, where the strata
have undergone but slight disturbance, the pro-
portion of volatile matter was found to be 9^ per
cent. 3dly. In the Pennsylvanian anthracite of the

lAP. XII.

Chap. XII. ANTHRACITE IN MICA SCHIST.

249

13 bed
Rhode
C. T.
3I1 the
ss into
ially in
yenite.
•merate
turned
hich I

rossino-
to the
Id the
trogen)
er and
cimens
where
ire un-
3 been
ropor-
d ash.
In the
strata
pro-
i per
>f the

i t

Lehiffh and Mauch Chunk mines, before alluded to
(p. 85.), the volatile ingredients are about 5 per
cent.*

In the plumbaginous anthracite of Worcester the
proportion of volatile matter is about 3 per cent.,
there being a slight trace of nitrogen. I conceive
that a more powerful action of those same plutonic
causes (heat, and other subterranean agencies) which
are capable of converting sedimentary into crystal-
line rocks may have expelled nearly all the gaseous
ingredients from a stratum of coal or anthracite, and
turned it into an impure plumbago, while the car-
boniferous grits and shales were changed into car-
bonaceous mica-schist, clay-slate, and quartzite. At
Little Falls, on the Mohawk River, and elsewhere in
the U. S., and at the Falls of Montmorency, and
other places in Canada, I have seen the lowest
Silurian strata resting un conformably on gneiss and
other hypogene formations. But we ought not to be
surprised on that account, if we find on the Ame-

* These results were obtained from an elaborate analysis made
for me by the kindness of Dr. J. Percy of Birmingham, since the
statement given at p. 90. was printed. They bear out the geo-
logical inferences, there referred to, of Professor H.D. Rogers ;
but it will be seen that the proportions of the chemical consti-
tuents differ greatly, the gaseous matter being only half the
previously estimated quantity. For details of the analysis and
manipulations, see Appendix to a paper by the author, in the
Journal of Geol. Soc, London, Ko XL 1845.

M 5

,i:v

250

LECTURES IN

Chap. XII.

>:■■

I ,

li 11

rican continent, as in the Swiss Alps and other
regions in Europe, strata containing plants of the
coal-measures, or of still newer dates, which have
acquired the hypogene or metamorphic structure.
Xear the Atlantic border of the United States, in
particular, we should be prepared for such a dis-
covery, for we know that those powerful movements
which have given rise to the Appalachian chain,
folding and dislocating the solid rocks for a breadth
of 150, and a length of more than 1000 miles, and
the injection into the eastern portion of the chain, of
igneous rocks of the trappean and plutonic order, are
phenomena posterior in date to the deposition of the
American carboniferous strata. During so long a
series of subterranean changes as are implied by these
disturbances it may well have hai^pened that con-
siderable masses of the coal-bearing, as well as of
more ancient paleozoic strata, should have assumed a
crystalline texture.

At a small New Eno-land town in the Taconic
hills above mentioned I was getting some travelling
instructions at the bar of an inn, when a carpenter
entered who had just finished his day's work, and
asked what lecture wo ild be given that evening.
The reply was, Mr. N. on the Astronomy of the
jNIiddle Ages. Pie then inquired if it was gratis,
and was answered in the negative, the price being

AP. XII.

Chap. XII. NEW ENGLAND VILLAGES.

251

twenty-live cents (or one shilling English) ; upon
which he said he should go, and accordingly returned
home to dress. It reflects no small credit on the
national system of education in New En«j,land, that
crowds of the labouring classes of both sexes should
seek recreation, after the toils of the day are over, in
listening to discourses of this kind. Among the
most popular subjects of lectures which I saw an-
nounced in newspapers or placards in different towns
and villages were Temperance, a cause which has
made great progress of late years among Protestants
as well as Catholics, and which began in the U. S.
fifteen years before the corresponding movement in
Great Britain; Phrenology, to the pretensions of
which the Americans lend too credulous an ear ; the
History of the American Revolution; the Present
State and Past History of China ; Travels in the Holy
Land ; Meteorology, and a variety of other topics.

April 15. — Visited Professor Hitchcock at Am-
herst College, Massachusscts, by whom the ••geolo-
gical survey of that State has been ably executed.
He showed me several ridges and large rounded
hillocks of transported materials, or " drift," north of
Amherst, surrounding swamps, in precisely the same
manner as those usually referred to the glacial j^criod
in Scotland and Northern Europe. They have been
called " moraines " by some geologists ; but if we call

SI 6

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fi!

ill

f. n

r I

252

rOSSIL FOOTSTEPS OF BIRDS. Chap. XII.

in the agency of ice, as I am well disposed to do, we
must attribute their accumulation to the melting of
icebergs charged with fragments of gravel and rock
rather than to glaciers. Professor Hitchcock has, in
fact, styled them iceberg moraines.

At Smith's Ferry, near Northampton, about
eleven miles north of Springfield, I examined, in
company with the Professor, the red sandstone on
the banks of the Connecticut E-iver, where the cele-
brated foot-prints of birds are beautifully exhibited.
The rock consists of thin-bedded sandstone (New
Red, Trias ?), alternating with red-coloured shale,
some of the flags being distinctly ripple -marked.
The dip of the layers, on which the Ornithichnites
are imprinted in great abundance, varies from eleven
to fifteen degrees. It is evident that in this place
many superimposed beds must have been successively
trodden upon, as diflerent sets of footsteps are
traceable throuo;h a thickness of sandstone exceedinc:
ten feet. My companion also pointed out to me
that some of the beds, exposed several yards down
the river, and containing Ornithichnites, would, if pro-
longed, pass under those of the principal locality, and
make the entire thickness throughout which the im-
pressions prevail at intervals, perhaps, twenty or thirty
feet. We cannot, therefore, explain these phenomena
simply by supposing large sheets of mud to have

.! !

'. XII.

Chap. XII. FOSSIL FOOTSTEPS OF BIRDS.

253

), we

been spread out by the tidal waters, as may be
observed on the broad flats bordering the Bay of
Fundy. These last, it is true, as will be shown in a
future chapter, exhibit the recent foot- prints of birds,
in many successive layers, for a depth of two or three
inches; but I cannot conceive such markings to
extend through a thickness of twenty-five feet
without supposing a subsidence of the ground to
have taken place from time to time during the
deposition of the layers on which the birds walked.
The tracks are too well defined and distinct to have
been made under water : there are clear indications
of joints in the different toes ; and there is generally
such a deviation from a straight line in any three
prints following each other as is observable in the
trifid marks which birds leave on the sands of the
sea-coast. The birds must have been of various
sizes, from that of a small sand-piper to bipeds
larger than the ostrich ; a.cid it is highly interesting to
remark how regularly the distance between the
footsteps increases or diminishes in proportion to the
size of the foot-marks. In some of the most di-
minutive, for example, they are no more than three
inches apart, but in the case of the largest {Oriii-
thichnites gigas) they are from four to six feet. The
length of the foot in the huge species last mentioned
is in some instances no less than nineteen inches. Its

254

FOSSIL FOOTSTErS OF BIRDS. Chap. XII.

I f

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magnitude being nearly twofold that of the African
ostrich, as estimated by the foot (ta- pede Ilercidem),
and the acknowledged antiquity of the rock, dis-
inclined many naturalists to adopt the views of Pro-
fessor Hitchcock, when he referred the markings to
extinct birds ; but the discovery of the bones of the
Moa or Deinornis of New Zealand, described by
Mr. Owen, proved the existence, at no remote
period, of feathered bipeds nearly as gigantic, and
reconciled the zoologist at least to the credibility of
the fact, however marvellous.

The waters of the Connecticut being low, I had
an opportunity of seeing a ledge of rock of red shale
laid bare, on which were imprinted a single line of
nine footsteps of Ornithichnitcs (jiganteusy turning
alternately right and left, and separated from each
other by intervals of abo^^t five feet. At one spot
there was a space several yards square, where the
entire surface of the shale was irregular and jagged,
owing to the number of footsteps, not one of which
could be traced distinctly, as when a flock of sheep
have passed over a muddy road ; but on withdrawing
from this area the confusion gradually ceased, and
the tracks became more and more distinct. The
Professor informed me, that since he first announced
his belief, in 1836, that these inij)ressions were refer-
able to birds, he had observed above two thousand

CilAP. XII.

MOUNT nOLTOKE.

255

foot-prints, probably made by nearly thirty distinct
species, all indented on the upper surface of the
strata, and only exhibiting casts in relief on the
under side of the beds resting on such indented sur-
faces.

This sandstone is of much higher antiquity (see
p. 125.) than any formation in which fossil bones
or other indications of birds have been detected in
Europe. Still we have no ground for inferring from
such fticts that the feathered tribe made its first ap-
pearance in the western hemisphere at this period.
It is too common a fallacy to fix the era of the lirst
creation of each tribe of plants or animals, and even of
animate beings in general, at the precise point where
our present retrospective knowledge happens to stop.
The discoveries in Connecticut ought to teach us
extreme caution in deducing general conclusions
from mere negative evidence, especially when we
infer the non-existence of land animals from the
absence of their remains in contemporaneous marine
strata.

On leaving Amherst for Springfield, we ascended
Mount Holyoke, the lower part of Avhich is formed
of horizontal strata of red sandstone, while the sum-
mit is capped with a picturesque mass of basaltic
greenstone. This hill has been isolated by denuda-
tion, and from its summit we enjoyed a fine view of

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256

GEOLOGY OF

CUAP. XII.

the fertile plain of the winding Connecticut. On its
flanks we gathered the blue Hepatica triloba, the
Houstonia cerulea, a white saxifrage, the May flower,
Epigcea repens, and several plants, which have been
recently naturalised in British gardens.

Immediately after my arrival at Boston I set out
(April 19th) to exjilore the island of Martha's Vine-
yard, off" the south coast of IMassachusetts. Travellers
who made this excursion a few years ago complain of
being jolted in a coach over deep ruts and huge
stones : now, an excellent railway carried me rapidly
to New Bedford on the coast, where a steam-boat
was in readiness, so that, having started long after
sunrise, I was landed on " the Vineyard," eighty
miles distant from Boston, in time to traverse half the
island, Avhicli is about 20 miles long from east to
west, before sunset. Late in the evening I reached
the lofty cliffs of Gayhead, more than 200 feet high,
at the western end of the island, where the highly-
inclined tertiary strata are gaily coloured, some con-
sisting of bright red clays, others of white, yellow,
and green sand, and some of black lignite. They have
been compared, not unaptly, by Professor Hitchcock,
to the tertiary beds of Alum Bay in the Isle of Wight,
which they resemble in appearance, though not in
age. I collected many fossils here, assisted by some
resident Indians, who are very intelligent. The sec-
tion is continuous for four fifths of a mile, the beds

XII.

Chap. XII. ISLAND OF MAHTIIA's VINEYAKD. 257

illppiiig to the N. E. at an angle of from 35° to 50°,
and in some places to 70°. Their entire thickness
must be very great, exceeding 2000 feet. The clays
predominate over the sands. In the black beds con-
taining lignites coniferous wood is abundant, and
amber is said to have been found. The organic re-
mains prevail at intervals in various strata, but I ex-
tracted most of them from a bed of green sand (A),

Fig. 6.

N.E.

s. \v.

Section at Cayhrad,

A. Lighthouse. b. Greunsand with sharks' teeth.

c. Osseous conglomerate with walrus. d. Drift.

near the north-eastern end. They consisted of casts
of shells, teeth of large sharks, the vertebra) of a
dolphin, and of a whale of great size. I also disco-
vered a tooth referred by Mr. Owen to the canine
tooth of a seal.

Together with these, I found numerous nodules
of the shape of kidney potatoes, from one to two
inches in diameter, smooth externally, which I pre-
sume to have been coprolites. They have been
analysed for me by my friend J. Middleton, Esq.,
F. G. S., and found to contain no less than 50 per
cent, of phosphate of lime, the constitution of the
latter being such as is peculiar to organic substances.
They also consist of fluoride of calcium, chloride of

2/i8

FOSSIL WALRUS.

Chap. XII.

■ I

1^ .li

sodium, and other elements. Tliesc coprolites, there-
fore, seem closely analogous in composition as in age,
to those found by Professor Ilcnslow in the Suffolk
crag of Felixstow, and which accompany the bones
of sharks and cetacea.

Near the lighthouse there is a- great fold in the
beds, where they are so bent as to have twice a
north-easterly and once a, south-westerly dip. One of
these folded beds (c) consists of an osseous conglo-
merate, in which I found several rolled cetaceous re-
mains ; and I purchased from a fisherman residing
near the promontory a fossil skull, which he tt)ld nic
had fallen out of this conglomerate upon the beach
below. It retained but a small portion of the original
animal matter, was slightly rolled, and ]Mr. Owen re-
cognised it as the cranium of a Walrus, or IMorse,
nearly allied to the existing species (^Trichccus
RosmaruSy Linn.). On comparison, it was oljservcd
to differ from it, in having six molar teeth, instead of
four, on each side of the upper jaw. There are eleven
specimens of the recent species in the College of
Surgeons, in all of which there are no more than four
grinders on each side. The tusk, also, of the Gayhcad
fossil has a rounder form than that of the recent
Morse. (See plate V.)

Near Chilmark, on the S. W. side of the island, I
found the same beds as at Gayhead, in a still more
disturbed state. Upon the whole, the organic remains.

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Chap. XII.

Martha's vineyard.

259

especially the sharks' teeth, lead me clccidetlly to the
opinion that the strata belong to a part of the tertiary
scries newer than the Eocene, to which they were
formerly referred. They must be at least as modern
as tlie Miocene marls of Virginia and Maryland, before
described (p. 134). Several of the sharks' teeth are
specifically identical with the fossils of those marls, and
of the Faluns of Tourainc and the Suffolk crag ; and
there are no grecnsands cither of the Eocene or cre-
taceous periods in Martha's Vineyard, as some have
conjectured. These conclusions, in regard to the mo-
dern date of this formation, arc interesting, because,
but for this small island, we should have had uo evi-
dence of the development of a great scries of subter-
ranean movements in this part of the American con-
tinent. The disturbances in question occurred
between the INIiocene epoch and the Boulder period ;
and wc know not how far their influence may have
extended over the hypogene rocks of New Engl ad.

The tertiary clays and sands of Martha's Vineyird
arc for the most part deeply buried beneath a mass of
drift {d, Fig. 6.), in which lie huge erratic blocks of
granite, often from twenty to thirty feet in diameter,
which must have come from the North, probably from
the mountains of New Hampshire. This covering of
granitic detritus imparts to the soil a sterile character
totally different from that which would naturally
belong to the tertiary clays and marls.

i^.

2G0

INDTAN!^.

Chap. XH.

II I
1 \

I jilliulod to some Indians settled near Gny-
licad, a remnant of the aborigines, who have been
protected by the Government of INIassachii setts, all
sales of land by them to the whites being null and
void by law. They make excellent sailors in the
whale-fishery of the South Seas, a source of great
wealth to the inhabitants of " the Vineyard," and of
New Bedford on the main land. That occui)ation,
with all its privations and dangers, seems admirably
suited to the bodily constitution and hereditary instinct
of a hunter tribe, to whom steady and continuous
labour is irksome and injurious.

The history of the extermination of the aboriginal
Indians of New England is a melancholy talc, es-
pecially after so many successful exertions had been
made to educate and christianize them. "When at
Harvard College, a copy of the Bible was shown me
by Mr. Jared Sparks, translated by the missionary
Father Elliott into the Indian tongue. It is now a
dead language, although preached for several genera-
tions to crowded congregations.

On my return across the Vineyard from Gayhead
I saw several spotted tortoises with red heads migra-
ting from one pond of fresh water to another. On the
sea-shore another novelty attracted my notice — seve-
ral large specimens of the King Crab (Limulus
polyphemus) were crawling about in the salt-water
pools left by the sea on the retiring of the tide.

■■i\

Chap. XI II.

BOSTON.

261

CHAPTER XIII.

Mcrfhig of Association of American Geologists at Boston. —
Popular libraries in Nciv Enfflaud. — Large sale of literary
works in the United States. — American universities. — Harvard
College^ near Boston. — English univer-sitics. — Peculiarities of
their \system. — Historical sketch of the causes of these pecU'
liarities not of medieval origin. — Collegiate corporations. —
Their altered relation to the English universities after the
Beformation, — Constitidion given to Oxford by Leicester and
Laud. — System of public teaching, how superseded by the
collegiate. — Effects of the change. — Oxford Examination
StatiUe of 1 800. — Its subsequent modification and results. — Bise
of private tutoi's at Oxford and Cambridge. — Consequences
of this innovation. — Struggle at Oxford in 1 839 to restore
the professorial system. — Causes of its rejection. — Tractarian-
ism. — Supremacy of ecclesiastics. — Youthful examiners. —
Cambridge. — Advocacy of the system followed the?'e. — In-
fluence of the English academical plan on the cultivation of the
physical sciences, and all branches of progressive knowledge. —
Bemedies and reforms.

• I.

April 25. — I returned to Boston to attend the third
annual meeting of the Association of American Geolo-
gists, who had held their previous meetings of 1840
and 1841 at Philadelphia. On the present occasion
Dr. Morton took the chair, and in the course of the
week i^apers were read and freely discussed on a va-
riety of scientific questions by many of the leading

i I

262

MEETINC; OF C;EOLOGlST3. Chap. XIII.

\\\

Aiuericiui geologists, some of whom had come from
distant parts of the Union. Tlie i)atronagc afforded
by the state surveys has created a numerous ehiss both
of practised observers and able writers. Among those
engaged in these government undertakings, who took
part in these proceedings, I may mention Professor
Hitchcock, of jVIassachusetts, Professor W. B. Kogers,
of Virginia, Professor II. D. Rogers, of Pennsyl-
vania, ]VIr. Vanuxem, Dr. Emmons, INIr. Hall, and
Dr. Beck — all engaged on the survey of New York ;
Dr. Jackson, who has surveyed Rhode Island, Xew
Hampshire, and Maine ; and Dr. Locke, of Ohio.
There were also present Professor Silliman and his
son, ]\Iessrs. Nicollet, Redfield, Gould, Bailey, Dana,
Couthouy, Ilaldeman, Hubbard, J. L. Hayes, and
others, all known as authors or contributors to scien-
tific publications. The structure of the Alleghany
Hills, and of the coal-fields of America, the origin of
coral reefs, the glacial theory, the effects of icebergs,
the nature of the foot-marks in the red sandstone of
Connecticut valley, and other subjects, were de-
bated upon during the week, in an animated but
most amicable style. The citizens of Boston, learn-
ing that means were wanting for the publication of
a series of valuable memoirs, read at this and former
meetings of the association, came forward with their
usual liberality, and supplied funds, by aid of which

Chap. Xlir. nOSTOX. — rURLIC REQUESTS.

203

a volume entitled " Transactions of the Assoeiatlon
of American Geologists for 1840-42," a work reflect-
ing the liigliest credit on the cultivators of geology
and its kindred sciences in America, made its ai)i)car-
ance soon afterwards.

Munificent bequests and donations for public
pur[)oses, whether charitable or educational, form
a striking feature in the modern history of the
United States, and especially of New England.
Not only is it connnon for rich capitalists to leave
by will a portion of their fortune towards the
endowment of national institutions, but individuals
during their lifetime make magnificent grants of
money for the same objects. There is here no com-
pulsory law for the equal jiartition of property
among children, as in France, and, on the other
hand, no custom of entail or primogeniture, as in
England, so that the affluent feel themselves at
liberty to share their wealth between their kindred
and the public; it being impossible to found a
family, and parents having frequently the happiness
of seeing all their children well provided for and
independent long before their death. I have seen
a list of bequests and donations made during the
last thirty years, for the benefit of religious, chari-
table, and literary institutions, in the State of
Massachusetts alone, and they amounted to no less

n I

■*frw0 1' '^^ima^^^mnn T«

( i\

264

SALE OF BOOKS.

Chap. XIII.

> .

i, !

a sum than six millions of dollars, or more than
a million sterling.

There are popular libraries in almost every village
of Massachusetts, and a growing taste for the reading
of good books is attested by the sale of large
editions of such works as Herschel's Natural Phi-
losophy, Washington Irving's Columbus, and Plu-
tarch's Lives. Of each of these, from five to twenty
thousand copies have been sold. It will seem still
more remarkable, that no less than sixteen thousand
copies have been purchased of Johnes's Translation
of Froissart's Chronicles, illustrated by wood-en-
gravings, and twelve thousand of Liebig's Animal
Chemistry. These editions were very cheap, as
there was no author's copyright ; but it is still
more surprising, that about four thousand copies of
Prescott's Mexico should have been sold in one
year in the U. S. at the price of six dollars, or
about twenty-six shillings. When, in addition to
these signs of the times, we remember the grants
before alluded to, of the New England and other
states in behalf of public schools and scientific
surveys, we may indulge very sanguine hopes of
the future progress of this country towards a high
standard of general civilization. ^ .

The universities of the United States are annually
increasing in number, and their discipline in New

Chap. XIII. AMERICAN UNIVERSITIES.

265

England (to which my Inquiries on this head were
chiefly confined) is very strict ; a full staff of pro-
fessors, with their assistants or tutors, superintending
at once the moral conduct and intellectual culture of
the students. In each university, there is a divinity-
school, appropriated to some particular religious
denomination, which is Presbyterian or Independent
at Newhaven, in Connecticut, where there are about
six hundred students; and Unitarian at Harvard
College, near Boston, where there are about four
hundred. But youths belonging to various sects
resort indifferently to Newhaven, Harvard, and
other colleges, to pursue their ordinary academical
studies. After obtaining their first degree, they
enter, if intended for the ministry, some theological
faculty established in the same or in another uni-
versity, or constituting a separate institution for the
professional training of future divines. The Epis-
copalians have a flourishing college of this kind
in the State of New York. The Independents, or
Congregatioualists, have one at Andover in Massa-
chusetts, where a distinguished professor of biblical
learning has been known to draw Episcopalian « and
students of other sects to his lectures, no persons
being excluded, by subscription to articles of religion,
from entering and studying in any college.

The multiplication of academical establishments,

VOL. I. N

P If!

266

UNIVERSITIES IN SCOTLAND. Chap. XIII.

i '
i ;

Ii '

in consequence of every State, and every sect of
Christians in each State, being ambitious of having
schools of their own, is an evil, but one which
■would be greatly aggravated were the general as
well as the theological education in the universities
alike sectarian ; or if students of classical literature,
mathematics, law, and medicine, all required teachers
who agreed with them in every article of faith. It has
been remarked, by a living satirist, that the force of
sectarian animosity, like that of gravity, increases
inversely as the squares of the distance; but, in
spite of the occasional ebullition in recent times of
an intolerant spirit on both sides of the Atlantic,
there are many auspicious signs of the approach of
an era when differences of religious opinion will less
interfere with national systems of education, both
in schools and colleges. The present state of acade-
mical aftairs in Scotland will perhaps be thought incon-
sistent with this view, where one party has been endea-
vouring to expel from the universities all professors
who favour " free church " opinions, while the
seceders from the establishment, not satisfied with
a new divinity-school, have aimed at a new uni-
versity for general instruction. There is now reason,
however, to hope that the last-mentioned project
will fail. There are already too many academical
institutions in Scotland, in proportion to the means of

Chap. XIII.

SECTARIAN SPIRIT.

267

adequately remunerating the professors ; and their
farther impoverishment, by the withdrawal of stu-
dents from them to a new college, would be an
injury to science and civilisation. The policy of the
government in 1836, when an attempt was made
to unite King's and Marischal Colleges at Aberdeen,
was wise and statesmanlike, but it was baffled by the
local jealousies of the two ancient rivals. Every
eiFort should now be made to confine the new aca-
demical foundation to the faculty of theology ; and,
for the same reason, to prevent the establishment of
rival parochial schools, for the existing parish schools
are often at present inadequately supported. It is
deplorable enough to be compelled to admit the
necessity of any new academical establishment,
when we reflect that there is absolutely no differ-
ence of doctrine between the new rival churches
in Scotland; and that the points of dissent have
been deemed for a century and a half of such
subordinate importance, as not to afford justifiable
grounds for an open breach. In the Irish College
at Belfast, endowed by government, a professor of
Greek of acknowledged ability, nominated originally
by the crown, with the approbation of the Presby-
terians, has suddenly been deprived of the greater
part of his class in consequence of the " free church "
movement, althougli no blame is imputed to him on

N 2

268

HARVARD COLLEGE.

Chap. XIII.

! S

i «

the score of a proselytising spirit, or of a wish to
inculcate his own religious views. In the midst of
these and other discouraging circumstances, it is
satisfactory to observe, that three out of the five
Scotch universities have recently declared to Parlia-
ment their desire that the religious tests which
now shackle them and impair their efficacy may
be removed.

In no subject do the Americans display more
earnestness than in their desire to improve their
system of education, both elementary and academical.
They have sent missionaries to Europe, who have
published elaborate reports on the methods of
teaching now employed in Britain, Germany,
Holland, and France, and they seem ready to adopt
whatever appears worthy of imitation in these
different models. The great difficulty under which
they labour, and one inevitable in a new country, and
common to them and the British American colonies,
is the early age at which young men quit college,
sooner by at least two years than in England.

In Harvard College, Cambridge, near Boston, the
best endowed university in the United States, there
are thirty-two professors, each assisted by one or
more tutors. Many of them are well known in the
literary world as authors. Five only of the thirty-
two were educated for the pulpit, three of whom are

Chap. XIII.

HARVARD COLLEGE.

269

professors of divinity, one of ethics, and one of
history. All the students are required to attend
divine service in the churches to which they se-
verally belong, but the divinity-school for pro-
fessional education is Unitarian. The pupils are
examined in the New Testament, also in Palcy's
" Evidences," and Butler's " Analogy." The pro-
portion of professors to students (about 400 in
number) is far greater than that of college tutors
in the English universities. The tutors of Har-
vard College may be compared, in some degree,
to our private tutors, except that they are more
under the direction of the professors, being selected
by them from among the graduates, as the best
scholars, and each is specially devoted to some one
department of learning. These tutors, from whose
number the professors are very commonly chosen,
usually teach the freshmen, or first-year students, or
prepare pupils for the professors' lectures. Care is
also bestowed on the classification of the young
men, according to their acquirements, talents, and
tastes. To accomplish this object, the student, on
entering, may offer to undergo an examination,
and, if he succeeds, he may pass at once into
the second, third, or fourth year's class, the inter-
mediate steps be*.ng dispensed with; he may also
choose certain subjects of study, which arc regarded

N 3

270

ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES.

Chap. XIII.

f I

li \

as equivalents, or arc exchangeable with others.
Thus, in the four years of the regular academical
course, a competent knowledge of Latin, Greek, and of
various branches of mathematics, is exacted from all ;
but, in regard to other subjects, such as moral phi-
losophy, modern languages, chemistry, mineralogy, and
geology, some of them may be substituted for others,
at the option of the pupil. There are public ex-
aminations at the end of every term for awarding
honours or ascertaining the proficiency of students ;
who, if they have been negligent, are put back into
a previous year's class, the period of taking their
degree being in that case deferred. Honours are
obtainable for almost every subject taught by any
professor; but emulation is not relied upon as the
chief inducement for study. After passing an ex-
amination for the fourth year's class, the student can
obtain the degree of Bachelor of Arts, and may
enter the divinity, medical, or law schools.

Every inquiry into the present state of the
universities in America drew forth from my in-
formants, in return, many questions respecting Oxford
and Cambridge. I was asked by professors of
geology, chemistry, modern history, modern liter-
ature, and other branches of knowledge, why the
classes for these subjects had recently fallen off in
the English universities? was their decline to be

Chap. XIII. TECULIARITIES OF SYSTL2I.

271

ascribed to tractarianism, a form of religious doctrine
which, they said, had been recently transplanted
into the United States, and was growing vigorously
in the new soil ? I declared my conviction that the
tractarian movement at Oxford had been rather
one of the effects of the slow and gradual changes
introduced in modern times into the system of in-
struction there, than the cause of the recent banish-
ment from that seat of learning of many sciences
formerly taught there. The more I endeavoured to
explain the present state of our academical course of
study, and the peculiar organisation of the corps of
teachers to whom its superintendence is confided,
the more strange it appeared to my New England
friends ; and I myself became the more aware of its
distinctive and a?iomalous character, when contrasted
with the methods followed elsewhere. Many who
have been educated, like myself, at Oxford, are
ignorant of the system of education formerly acted
upon in our English universities, and of the real
nature or causes of the present state of things. I
shall, therefore, attempt to give, in the remainder of
this chapter, a brief account of the leading pecu-
liarities of our former and present academical ma-
chinery, and to point out its inevitable consequence,
the very limited range of studies which can be pur-
sued, so long as things remain unaltered. I shall do

N 4

"fi I

272

ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES.

Chap. XIII.

' '.

I '«

this the more willingly, because I know that any
information which may throw light on the subject
will be equally interesting to my readers on both
sides of the Atlantic.

It may awaken curiosity in those who have never
made any inquiries into these matters, if I make one
or two preliminary statements. In the first place,
then, the mass of students or undergraduates at
Oxford is divided into twenty-four separate com-
munities or colleges, very unequal in number, the
residents in each varying from 10 in the smaller to
about 140 in the larger colleges, and the whole
business of educating these separate sections of the
youth is restricted to the tutors of the separate
colleges. Consequently, two or three individuals,
and occasionally a single instructor, may be called
upon to give lectures in all the departments of human
knowledge embraced in the academical course of four
years. If the college be small, there is only
occupation and salary sufficient to support one tutor ;
any attempt, therefore, to subdivide the different
branches of learning and sciences among distinct
teachers is abandoned. There is no opportunity
for one man to concentrate the powers of his
mind on a single department of learning, to en-
deavour to enlarge its bounds, and carefully to form
and direct the opinions of his pupil. In a few of the

Chap. XIII.

ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES.

273

larger colleges, indeed, some rude approach to such a
partition is made, so far as to sever the mathematical
from the classical studies ; but even then the tutors
in each division, are often called upon, in the public
examinations, to play their part in both depart-
ments. Thus, a single instructor gives lectures
or examines in the writings of the Greek and
Roman historians, philoso])hcrs, and poets, together
with logic, the elements of mathematics, and theo-
logy.

For the benefit of my foreign readers, it may be
as well to remark, that the scholars to be taught are
not boys between the ages of fourteen and eighteen,
at which latter age the degree of Bachelor of Arts
was very commonly conferred in the olden times at
Oxford, but young men between eighteen and twenty-
two, who, at the expiration of their academical
course, usually quit college, and enter at once upon a
profession, or into political life. In the next place, I
may state, that the choice of teachers, to whom so
arduous and ambitious a task is allotted, is by no
means left open to free competition, like the professor-
ships in most ancient and modern universities ; but, on
the contrary, is confined within very narrow bounds.
The college tutors are selected from graduates Avho
are on the foundation of their respective colleges,
and who may have obtained their appointment ori-

N 5

274

ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES.

Chap. XIII.

ginally, some because they happened to be founder's
kin, or were educated at a particular school, others
because they were born in a particular town, county,
or diocese; a few only being selected from merit,
or as having distinguished themselves in examina-
tions open to all candidates. This latter class, how-
ever, has, it is true, increased of late years. Most
of these teachers forfeit their fellowships, and most
probably with it their office of tutor, if they should
marry, or if, after a certain number of years, they do
not embrace the clerical profession. They also look
to preferment in the Church, from their position in
their college, so that they have every inducement to
regard the business of teaching as a temporary calling,
subordinate and subsidiary to another, of a different,
and to them more advantageous and important, kind.
Their office as instructors is, in short, a mere step-
ping-stone to something else ; and they hope to gain
their reward, not when they are superannuated, for
then they would be unfit for highly responsible eccle-
siastical duties, but when they arc still in the prime
of life. In fact, their promotion is so contrived,
as at once to cut short the career of usefulness in
which they may have hitherto distinguished them-
selves.

It will naturally be taken for granted, by those
who have never investigated the history of tlie univer-

CUAP. XIII.

ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES.

275

sities, that the restrictions and fetters above enumerated
are all of monastic and medieval origin. The celibacy
of the teachers, the almost entire monopoly of tuition
by the clergy, seem clearly to point to a period more
remote than the Keformation, and when the supremacy
and exorbitant power of the church of Rome were
still at their height. But nothing can be fiirthcr from
the truth. On inquiry, we learn with surprise, that
the original plan of education at Oxford and Cam-
bridge, as in the other European universities, was
public and common to the whole mass of students.
The present system has been upheld by no blind ve-
neration for ancient usages, nor by the conservative
principle carried to excess. There has been no dread
of innovation exhibited in modern times. The sub-
stitution of the collegiate for a more general univer-
sity scheme of instruction is the result of a modern
revolution, altogether subsequent to the era of the
Keformation, and no small part of it is a creation
of yesterday, devised at the close of the eighteenth,
and only carried out since the commencement of
the nineteenth, century.

In order to understand how the colleges, or a few
private corporations, obtained their ascendency over
our two great national institutions, it is necessary to
revert to the history of those early ages when the
European universities originated. It appears that

N 6

276

COLLEGIATE CORPORATIONS. Chap. XIII.

¥ i

I '

there was often a prodigious concourse of students to
tliosc seats of learning wliere the public teachers ac-
quired celebrity. Wc may refuse to credit sonic old
chroniclers, who reckon the number at Oxford and
elsewhere at ten, twenty, and even thirty thousand ;
but it is certain that the scholars were often so crowded
together in small towns, as to be exposed to great
hardships, owing to the exorbitant price demanded
for board and lodging. Benevolent individuals, who
commiserated the sufferings of the poorer students,
were induced from time to time to found houses,
where they might obtain accommodation, and some-
times board, free of expense. Those who were not
on such foundations were required, whether graduates
or undergraduates, to belong to some Hall, or Inn, the
head of which was usually elected by the scholars,
and api)roved of by the chancellor of the university,
or his deputy. As a large part of the students were
boys, corresponding in age to those now educated at
our public schools, they were placed under the special
guardianship of some tutor, who was expected to look
to their orderly behaviour, their religious exercises,
and even, as appears by the old statutes, to " see that
they conformed to academical rules in regard to matters
of external appearance, such as their clothes, boots,
and hair." It was the duty of the head of each house
to see that the tutors were fit for their office, and to

CuAi». XIII. COLLEGIATE COUPOIIATIONS.

277

take care tliat the pupils attended the lectures of tlie
public renders, or Masters of Arts, who gave lectures
in the Schools.

On the Continent, rho houses founded for the sup-
port of indigent teachers and scholars were entirely
subjected to the authorities of their respective uni-
versities; but in England several of the colleges
were governed by private statutes, over which the
university exercised no control. Hence they had
often interests apart from those of the university and
of the public ; but for centuries they were few in
number, there being only three colleges in Oxford in
the fourteenth century ; whereas there were three hun-
dred halls, or licensed boarding-houses, each sustained
by the private contributions of students. At length
the Reformation worked suddenly a complete revolu-
tion in the relative position of the collegiate corpora-
tions and the academical body at large. The religious
schism banished many students who did not acquiesce
in the new opinions. The temper of Henry the
Eighth was so capricious and uncertain, and the
policy of his three immediate Successors so contradic-
tory, that it was difficult to know what was the reli-
gion by law established for the current year ; still less
possible to calculate what would be the statutable or-
thodoxy for the year ensuing. Keasonable fears
were also entertained that, as the monastic property

278

HISTORY OF

Chap. XIII.

If I

had been confiscated, the endowments of the univer-
sities might not long be spared, so that literature and
the church were uninviting professions, whether for
ambitious or conscientious men.* The halls, depending
for their support on the confluence of students, were
ruined, except a few which were connected with certain
colleges. Land and houses fell in value in Oxford, so
that the colleges were able to purchase considerable pro-
perty from the impoverished burghers for a trifling con-
sideration. Four new colleges were established within
half a century subsequent to the Reformation, and
altogether six during the sixteenth century, some of
which were built on tli : sites of suppressed monaste-
ries, or on land obtained by grants from the crown,
or purchased for an insignificant pr'ce. After this
period, only one college was founded — in 1610; and
three of the eight remaining halls changed into col-
leges, in 1610, 1702, and 1740.

Originally few of the colleges admitted undergra-
duates not on the foundation ; but they now opened
their gates, and were able to include the whole acade-
mical population within their walls, by w^hich they ob-

* For many details respecting the early constitution of the
universities of Paris and Oxford, and the subsequent changes
in the English Universities, see an article by Sir William
Hamilton, Bart., who was educated at Oxford, and is now Pro-
fessor of Logic in the University of Edinburgh, Edin. lleview,
No. xcvi., June, 1831.

Chap. XIII.

ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES.

279

taincd a preponderating weight and influence. This
power, however, might have been defeated, if the Earl
of Leicester, chancellor of the university, had not ob-
tained, in 1570, an exclusive right to institute new
halls, which was afterwards by statute vested in his
successors. As the chief magistrate acted usually in
concert with the heads of colleges, it was henceforth
easy for the colleges to prevent any new hall from
interfering with their monopoly ; whereas, previously
to 1570, the establishment of a hall was easy, it being
only required that a small number of scholars should
hire a house, find caution for a year's rent, and choose
for principal a graduate of respectable character.
The chancellor, or his deputy, could not, in that case,
refuse to sanction his appointment.

The new constitution, procured for the university
by Leicester, was considerably modified under the
chancellorship of Archbishop Laud, who raised the
heads of houses to the rank of a public body, called
the Hebdomadal Board, to whom the privilege
was given of proposing new laws to the House of
Convocation. To the latter, consisting of the doctors
and the masters of arts, the supreme legislation was
still left, but without the power of initiating any
measures. The heads were, by the constitution of
their colleges, almost all ecclesiastics, and chosen
from among the fellows of their respective colleges.

280

OXFORD.

Chap. XIII.

m !

i :

Their election was, therefore, subject to all the
disabilities and restrictions imposed on the fellows
by the caprice of the founder. Thus two new
elements, the preponderating influence of clerical
over lay rulers, and the fortuitous restrictions in-
vented for the regulation of private corporations,
entered suddenly, and as it were accidentally, into
the legislative constitution of the university.

From this period, it was almost inevitable, that the
predilections of men of one profession, and the private
interests of certain corporate bodies, should modify,
if not remodel, the whole acadcuical system, and
frequently prevail over interests of a more general
and national character. Soon after the university
had begun to recover from the shock of the Re-
formation, several new readerships and professorships
were endowed by Laud, and several others in the next
century, after his time, in aid of that system of
public instruction in the schools, which had been
conducted originally by certain Masters of Arts,
who were required to read and expound diflTerent
subjects. The teaching of the undergraduates was
now, therefore, divided between the colleges and the
public instructors appointed by the university. The
latter would have regained their former ascendancy,
if they had been supported by the Heads of houses,
who were intrusted with the charge of watching

«;;!•

Chap. XIII.

COLLEGE TUTORS.

281

over the observance of statutes, and all " scho-
lastic improvements." But they (the Heads) no
longer obliged the students to attend public lectures
regularly; and they frequently allowed some of
the professors to desist from lecturing altogether,
which many of them, from indolence, and from finding
their audiences fall off, were disposed to do, especially
as their instructions were given gratis. Such was
the ordinary custom in the old universities; but
in later times it had been found that this arrange-
ment was very defective, that the professors were
negligent, and that the students undervalued what
cost them nothing, so that fees were permitted to
be exacted. In Oxford, however, the professors
were supplanted, in respect to these fees, by the
college tutor, to whom a large part of the business
of education was thus gradually transferred. Had
a different course been adopted, the professors,
acquiring in many cases celebrity in their respective
departments, and devoted permanently, and often
enthusiastically, to the sciences they taught, would
have married and settled for life in Oxford; they
would have gained an ascendancy over the minds
of the students and the younger graduates in convo-
cation ; and many of them would have acquired an
European reputation. The colleges might naturally
feel jealous of alloAving the growth of such a coun-

282

OXFORD.

Chap. XIII.

I;
ii

terpoisG to the power with which they had been
recently invested.

When the old machinery Avas thus falling into
disuse, and before the plan of college tuition was
fully organised, the academical discipline appears
to have been extremely lax, and the provision
for education defective in the extreme. It was
often difficult to find a college tutor competent
to undertake the office, and there was occasionally
only one or two of the resident fellows willing to
accept of it. Instead of these important places being
open to a free and fair competition, we may say
that they were often held by self-appointed teachers.
A regulation was made, that all the undergraduates
should lodge within the walls of some college, which
had the effiict of preventing students from freely
selecting those tutors who had the highest reputation,
as rooms within the walls were soon filled, and no
overflow was allowed of pupils lodging in the town.
The enforcement of this law was said to have been
jealously watched by some colleges, which would
otherwise have been all but deserted, towards the
close of the last century. The numerous scholar-
ships and other endowments of the university, the
college livings, and the academical degrees required
as qualifications for entering holy orders, rendered
the university very independent of public opinion;

Chap. XIII. EXAMINATION STATUTE OF 1800. 283

and whether it taught nothing efficiently, or failed
to accommodate its form of instruction to the pro-
gress and spirit of the age, it could never apprehend
a serious diminution of students.

Occasionally, there were examinations and a revival
of studious habits in a particular college, or some pro-
fessor gave a popular course of lectures, and drew
large audiences. Thus Bradley, the famous astrono-
mer, delivered, between the years 1746 and 1760, to
a class of pupils averaging 57 in number, lectures on
Natural Philosophy, not in Latin, as had been the old
practice, but in English. But the general indolence of
the instructors, and the idleness and dissipation of the
young men, became so notorious and flagrant towards
the close of the eighteenth century, that a reform was
loudly called for, and the governing body became
deeply impressed with a sense of its expediency.
Many plans were devised for carrying it into effect.
As the annual or terminal examinations in several
colleges had been found most useful in maintaining
orderly habits among the young men, it was proposed
to improve the public examinations, which had be-
come a mere form, and to compel every one to pass
them before obtaining his degree of Bachelor of Arts.
Honours were to be awarded to those who distin-
guished themselves.

It was now evident that the shape in which

f I

I '•

t ■

I .'

t I

. I

284

OXFORD.

Chap. XIII.

this new statute was framed would determine what
studies should henceforth be encouraged or dis-
couraged in the university. It was clearly jiointed
out, at the time, that all those subjects which
could not lead to academical distinctions would be
virtually proscribed ; and that the well-known maxim
of our lawyers in the interpretation of statutes
would hold good in this case, " De non apparentibus
et de non existentibus eadem est ratio." Whatever
science was omitted in the list of studies selected for
the trial of strength would be henceforth not merely
slighted, but virtually blotted out of the academical
course. Academical honours were here no empty
bubbles, but might be expected to lead to fellowships,
tutorships, livings, and other solid advantages. If the
Heads of Houses and Members of Convocation had
been simply legislating for national objects, and had
not been the representatives of private and collegiate
interests, which were not always identical with those
of the public, it would have been easy to devise a
comprehensive system of examinations, consisting of
several boards, to which the professors, as well as
tutors, would have been appointed, in stricter accor-
dance with the spirit, and even letter, of the old sta-
tutes, than the new law which was then enacted. But
this might soon have altered entirely the relative posi-
tion in which the college tutors now stood to the public

AP. XIII.

Chap. XIII. EXAMINATION STATUTE OF 1800. 286

e what
or dis-
pointed
which
uld be
maxim
tatutcs
entibus
[latever
:ted for
merely
lemical
emj)ty
vvships.
If the
on had
nd had
legiate
1 those
3vise a
ting of
veil as
accor-
>ld sta-
l. But
^e potfi-
public

readers and professors. The latter would soon have
acquired greater consequence in convocation ; and had
such a measure been proposed by the Hebdomadal
Board it would probably have been lost. Accordingly,
it was soon found that the new examination statute of
the year 1800 was to be worked by the college tu-
tors, young men for the most part about thirty years
of age ; and such being the case, no one can deny that
studies embracing the Greek and Boman writers on
history, philosophy, poetry, logic, rhetoric, and ethics,
besides Christian theology, and the elements of mathe-
matics, Avas as extensive a range as was compatible with
such an executive. If they erred, their error certainly
consisted in enlarging the circle of subjects far beyond
the capacity of the college tutor, be his talents ever so
great. The legislators especially displayed discretion in
excluding from the schools all the more progressive
branches of knowledge ; for, in order to be a safe guide
in directing the opinions of a pupil, or teaching what
is known in such branches, liable as they are to be
modified from year to year, by new facts, dis-
coveries, and investigations, the preceptor must have
leisure to devote his mind exclusively to one subject.
The new statute did not pass without a severe
struggle. The rector of Lincoln College, in parti-
cular, opposed it, as a measure that would extinguish all
" thirst of knowledge." " There would henceforth," he

1 1
Hi

286

OXFORD EXAMINATIONS.

CUAP. XIII.

said, "be no university at all, but a system of cramming
and partial teaching, after which the student would
go out into the world with a narrow mind and darker
understanding."

The necessity, however, of preparing for the com-
pulsory examination, before taking a degree, worked
immediately a salutary change in the habits and
moral conduct of the idler students. The more clever
and ambitious amongst them began to be excited by
the competition for honours ; a marked improvement
was soon apparent in academical discipline ; the uni-
versity gained in public favour, and the number of
students increased. The classes even of some of the
professors were strengthened ; but this effect was of
short duration. It was soon found that the honours
awarded at the examinations led to fellowships and
tutorships ; and the honourable rivalry of many of the
colleges induced them to throw open their fellowships
and scholarships much more freely than formerly to
candidates of the highest merit; the standard of merit,
however, being, for the most part, measured by the
new examinations in the schools. New methods were
from time to time invented for classifying the youths
according to their intellectual qualifications. In 1807,
students who distinguished themselves were arranged
in two classes, in 1809 in three, and in 1826 in four.
A preliminary examination, called the responsions, or

AP. XIII.

Chap. XIII. OXFORD TRIVATE TUTORS.

287

iimming
t would
I darker

lie corn-
worked
its and
e clever
jited by
>vement
the uni-
mber of
e of the
t was of
honours
lips and
y of the
owships
aerly to
f merit,

by the
ids were

youths
nl807,
rranged
in four,
iions, or

" little go," was introduced at the end of the first two
years, or in the middle of the student's residence at Ox-
ford. The examinations for degrees were made more
and more stringent, and emulation at length stimulated
to so high a pitch, that health was often sacrificed in
the effort to gain the prize. Useful habits of appli-
cation were often acquired, but the system was not
calculated to foster a love of knowledge for its own
sake. To some there was even danger of injury both
bodily and mental ; for if they succeeded, they were
tempted to believe that they had already achieved
something great ; if they failed, their abilities were
underrated, both by themselves and their contempo-
raries.

Another important revolution now took place.
As the business of education had previously passed
from the public readers and professors to the college
tutors, so the latter were now in no small degree
superseded by the private tutors or " crammers."
These were graduates chosen by the young men
themselves, at an expense of 40/. or 50/. a year,
to read with them, both in term-time and vacation,
and prejiare them for the examination. An Oxford
tutor informed me that, in the years 1840 and 1841,
no less than 250, or one fifth of the resident stu-
dents, procured this kind of assistance, the aggregate
sum paid by them amounting to more than 10,000/.

:;|

288

OXFORD TRIVATE TUTORS. Chap. XIII.

lit

n year ! These young teachers watch the examin-
ations, are acquainted with the style of the questions,
whether vivd voce or on paper, and often with
the peculiar views of the examiner. It is their
business to prevent their pupil from wasting his
strength on topics not likely to be adverted to, and
often to enable him to get by rote answers to
certain interrogatories. The students are frequently
unable to obtain this aid from the college tutor,
whose system of lecturing is more general, and
who cannot direct his attention to the individi;;.:!
wants and capacities of every pupil. The under-
graduates, therefore, may be required to attend, be-
tween ten and one o'clock, the lectures of the college
tutors. The next two hours (from one to three) are
generally occupied by the private tutorv-. comprising
that portion of the day during which the professors
are by statute required to lecture. At three o'clock,
it is high time for the young men to seek recreation
and exercise ; so that all the youths, especially the
cleverest ones, are so entirely absorbed in a routine
of study connected with the examinations, that the
professorial class-rooms must unavoidably be aban-
doned. Bachelors of arts, and other graduates, had
been heretofore in the habit of attending public
lectures; but most of them now became engrossed
with the new and lucrative business of cramming.

r. XIII.

Chap. XIII. miVATE TUTORS AT CAMBRIDGE. 289

samin-
jstions,
1 with
i their
ng his
:o, and
ers to
[ucntly

tutor,
il, and
ividij 1
under-
nd, be-
college
•ee) are
prising
)fessors
o'clock,
rcation
lly the
routine
lat the
aban-
es, had

public
xrossed

mg.

We learn from Dr. Peacock, now Dean of Ely,
for many years an eminent tutor at Trinity College,
Cambridge, that in that university, also, a similar
revolution took place nearly at the same time.*
" A large proportion," he says, " of all the students,
industrious or idle, rich or poor, resort to private
tutors, to whom they pay, on an average, about 40/.
a year. These teachers," he continues, " are young
and inexperienced, and not competent to convey
enlarged views " to their pupils. The labour imposed
on them is too absorbing and severe to allow of the
simultaneous prosecution of original studies ; and
" this unhappy system has contributed, more than
any other cause, to the very general, and, in some
respects, just complaints, which have been made of
late years, of the paucity of works of learning and
research which had issued from the University of
Cambridge."

And here I may observe, that it is often the
boast of writers who extol our university system
above that of other countries, that we promote
liberal studies, and do not condescend to qualify
students for a lucrative profession or trade. But what
is the real fact ? Do not the majority of the ablest
students toil at Latin, Greek, and mathematics, with

* See his excellent work on the Statutes of the University
of Cambridge, p. loG.

VOL. I. O

I I

•t

290

mOFESSIOXAL EDUCATION.

Chap. XIII.

purely professional objects ? Are they not preparing
tlicmsclves for becoming private tutors, schoolmasters,
and college-tutors ; expecting to combine these avo-
cations with fellowships, or with clerical duties?
Arc not the things they learn regarded as the means
of earning a livelihood, or what the Germans call
" Brodstudien," in plain English, to " make the pot
boil?" That some students should be qualifying
themselves at the university to become masters in our
public schools is highly desirable; and it would be
well if the station in society of the schoolmaster,
apart from any adventitious aid derived from unit-
ing with it the clerical function, ranked as high
in England as it docs in Germany and the New-
England States; but why should not the utilitari-
anism of our universities comprehend equally, within
the sphere of its educational training, those branches
of general knowledge which are equally essential to
the future statesman, divine, lawyer, physician, and
men of other liberal callings ?

I am aware that it may be said, in regard to
" crammers," that, under every system, some kind
of private tuition will be required, and it will be
asked, whether the assistants, under a professorial
plan of instruction, would not be equally kept back
in the improvement of their own minds ? Certainly
not — they would divide themselves at once into

' 1 1

: il

! '1^

Chap. XIII.

rnivATi: tutors.

291

as many sections as there are clcpartmcnts of study
recognised in the public examinations. They would
devote tlicir minds steadily to subjects connected
with theology, or with law, or medicine, or engineer-
ing, or literary criticism, or applied mathematics,
or other branches. Occasionally they would lecture
for the professor, who, if worthy of his charge,
must advance with his science, and not be ignorant
of new discoveries and theories. Like him, they
could not remain stationary. They would aspire
in due time to fill his place, or some chair in another
university. Such private tutors, whether lay or
clerical, would not be found, at the expiration of ten
years of hard and painful labour, precisely at the
point from which they set out immediately after
taking their first degree.

In the year 1839, a last and most vigorous
attempt was made at Oxford to restore the functions
of the professorial body, which had now become
contracted within the narrowest limits. The pro-
fessors of Experimental Philosophy, Comparative
Anatomy, Chemistry, ^Mineralogy, Geology, Botany,
Geometry, and Astronomy, many of them well known
in the literary and scientific world, sent in a repre-
sentation to the heads of Houses, in which they
declared their inability to discharge the duties they
had undertaken, notwithstanding their unabated zeal

o 2

i.2

»!l

■1

4 p'

^ '

1 :

111

;,| ■

1 :

292

PROPOSED REFORM

Chap. XIII.

and devotion. They accompanied their petition
with a printed statistical table, showing how the
number of their classes had fallen off annually,
during a period in which, as they truly observed,
the branches of knowledge taught by them were
rising in popular favour and importance. It ap-
peared by their table, that the anatomy class had
dwindled between the years 1819 and 1838 to less
than half, and that of astronomy to one fifth of
its original numbers. The same had happened to
the class of chemistry, between 1822 and 1838,
many others having declined in the like ratio.
The petitioners observed that, if no change were
made in the examination statute, their usefulness
as professors was at an end.

A majority of the heads of Houses were favourable
to a reform, and they consequently proposed a new
examination statute, in which there was a provision
requiring attendance on at least two series of
professorial lectures, as a preliminary qualification
for the bachelor of arts' degree. The subjects of
the various professors' lectures were classified under
two heads, and one course was to be selected by the
student from each division. The professors were
required to keep a register of attendance, and give
certificates. Although a new board of examiners to
bestow honorary distinctions was not part of this

Chap. XIIT.

AT OXFOIID IN 1839.

293

plan, the measure might eventually have led to this
and other improvements.

But it was now too late — reform wns beyond the
power of the Hebdomadal Board. Several academical
generations had grown up under the new order of
things. The collegiate and private tutors were inte-
rested in opposing the new provisions, and they were
accordingly rejected in convocation. Yet while they
threw out that part of the proposed statute which
would have gone far towards reviving the professorial
chairs, they passed another part requiring the pro-
fessors of Astronomy, Experimental Philosophy, Che-
mistry, Geology, Mineralogy, Anatomy, Botany,
Medicine, Civil Law, English Law, Greek, Arabic,
Sanscrit, Anglo-Saxon, Poetry, Modern History,
and Political Economy, to deliver regular courses
of lectures. They were, in fact, bound not only
by ancient statutes to require the teachers above
enumerated faithfully to discharge their duty, but
in modern times, or since the examination sta-
tute of 1800, they had sanctioned the foundation
of new chairs, such as Experimental Philosophy,
Mineralogy, Geology, Political Economy, and Sans-
crit, and had accepted annual grants from the Crown
to endow certain readerships. In homage, therefore, to
the moral obligations they had incurred, not to render
these new and old foundations nugatory, they continued

o 3

'■I

• ■if

294

CHANGES OF SYSTEM

Chap. XIII.

; i

i\'

to exact an outward conformity to the statutes, by
enforcing the delivery of lectures, the efficiency of
which they allowed other parts of their system
entirely to defeat. Their conduct reminds us of
the orders issued by Charles the Fifth to offer up
prayers throughout Spain for the deliverance of the
Pope, while he suffered his army to retain him pri-
soner in the Castle of St. Angelo.

It must not be inferred, however, from the prece-
ding observations, that I assume that the majority of
the members of Convocation are not men of high
principle, and animated with a conscientious desire
of discharging faithfully their public duties. They
and their predecessors probably did not at any moment
deliberately plan or avow to themselves the line of
policy which they have followed out so systematically,
and with so much unity of purpose. The judgment
of each generation has been constantly biassed by the
same disturbing causes (the collegiate and clerical in-
terests), which, like a current steadily setting one
way, has insensibly carried the whole academical body
out of its true course. In conformity to these interests,
the original constitution has been gradually modified,
and the system, when changed, has formed the minds of
the succeeding generation, preparing it for new inno-
vations, all conceived in the same spirit. If any
single individual can be charged with a deliberate

Chap. XIII.

AT OXFORD.

295

purpose of altering, essentially, the ancient consti-
tution of the university, it is probably Archbishop
Laud.

The year 1839 was memorable in Europe for
another event, tending to prove how unpropitious to
the cultivation of the physical sciences is the eccle-
siastical spirit, whenever it obtains an undue powc:
of interference with academical institutions. In the
year alluded to, the first " congress " of scientific men
took place in Italy. It assembled at Pisa, under the
auspices of the enlightened prince who now reigns in
Tuscany. The Pope interdicted all the professors of
his colleges of Rome and Bologna, many of whom
were prepared to co-operate warmly with the new
association, from attending it. The papal prohibition
was continued at the subsequent meetings at Turin,
Florence, Milan^ and elsewhere. Nevertheless, the
congress flourished, and, in spite of the Pontiff's oppo-
sition, drew together many of the most distinguished
men from all parts of Europe, and of Italy, beyond
the confines of the States of the Church. It has also
given to the world five costly volumes of valuable
scientific memoirs, which, but for such patronage,
might have remained unpublished to this day.

Doubtless the vote of the Oxford Convocation in
1839 was influenced by various motives; among others,
a conscientious contempt for that sham professorial

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OrrOSITION to proposed Chap. XIII.

system which the graduates had so long contrasted
with a reality, in the form of compulsory tutorial
lectures and examinations, leading to degrees, and
often followed by fellowships, livings, prebendal
stalls, and bishoprics. In addition to these causes, it
has been very generally understood that many, both
of the college and private tutors, were opposed to the
cultivation of the physical sciences on principle, on
account of their alleged irreligious tendency. No one
who reads some of the articles written by men who
were fellows or tutors at Oxford, in the British
Critic, against the " British Association for the Pro-
motion of Science," can wonder that such reports were
credited, or that they provoked, from a prelate edu-
cated at Oxford, the remark that " men who entertain
such fears seem to forget that the book of Nature and
the book of Revelation were both written by the
same Author."

Men are prone to undervalue those branches of
knowledge which are foreign to their own pur-
suits; and if physicians, or lawyers, or civil en-
gineers, had usurped as decided an ascendency in
the legislation of a university, as the clerical gra-
duates have now acquired at Oxford, complaints as
loud and well founded might have been heard, that a
due share of attention was not bestowed on studies
connected with theology. In this spirit, therefore.

Chap. XIII.

REFORM AT OXFORD.

297

it was attempted to mix up religious instruction with
the teaching of other subjects. By some tutors it was
held desirable that all ethics, metaphysics, and phi-
losophy should be " christianized."

The practice of taking up for the examinations
for honours such works as Butler's Analogy and Ser-
mons had been encouraged after the year 1830, Avhcn
a statute had passed " that the philosophy of the an-
cients might be illustrated in the schools, ' ex neoteri-
corum scriptis,' or by the writings of the moderns."
This and other changes had opened the door for
considerable modifications in the course of academical
study, and had given a new turn to the thoughts of
many of the most rising and talented young men. It
should be remembered that the last ten years has
been the era of the Tractarian movement at Oxford,
and the active intellect of the university has been for
the most part absorbed in theological controversy.
He who aspired to honours was bound in prudence to
consider that his young judge, the arbiter of his acade-
mical fate, might probably be an advocate of the views
set forth in some one or more of the Tracts for the
Times. He might be one who was fully impressed
with the dogma, that " ethics unconnected with the
church is a fundamental fallacy ;" that " man without
the church has no right to educate man * ; " that

* See Sewell'a Cliristian Morals, ch. iv. and x.

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298

niOFESSORIAL LECTURES Chap. XIII.

" youth is too .apt to delight in the inductive, instead
of the deductive, reasoning ; " — " to prefer novelty to an-
tiquity," investigation to obedience to authority, &c.

As an example of the deductive process, as applied
to my own favourite science, by a college tutor and
public examiner of this period, I may cite a passage
from lectures delivered in the university at the era
under consideration, and since published : —

" A geologist, deeply impressed with the mystery
of baptism, by which a ' new creature,' KaLvrj ktI(tl9,
is formed, by means of water and fire, would never
have fallen into the absurdities of accounting for the
formation of the globe solely by water or solely by
fire. Pie would not have maintained either a Yul-
canian or a Neptunian theory." * The reader may
well imagine, that, if other departments of science
were " christianized " after the like fashion, the scho-
lar might run some risk of emerging into the world,
from his academical career, with his reasoning powers
enfeebled, and his intellects mystified.

But to conclude our historical sketch. After the
year 1839, we may consider three-fourths of the
sciences, still nominally taught at Oxford, to have
been virtually exiled from the University. The class
rooms of the professors were some of them entirely,

* See Sewell's Christian Morals, ch. xxii..

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Chap. XIII. ABANDONED AT OXFOKD.

299

others nearly, deserted. Chemistry and botany at-
tracted, between the years 1840 and 1844, from
three to seven students ; geometry, astronomy, and
experimental philosophy, scarcely more ; mineralogy
and geology, still taught by the same professor
who, fifteen years before, had attracted crowded
audiences, from ten to twelve; political economy
still fewer ; even ancient history and poetry scarcely
commanded an audience ; and, strange to say, in
a country with whose destinies those of India are
so closely bound up, the first of Asiatic scholars
gave lectures to one or two pupils, and these might
have been absent, had not the cherished hope of
a Boden scholarship for Sanscrit induced them to
attend.

As if to complete the cycle of change, and to
cause the system to depart as widely as possible from
the original university, which secured for the students
the services of pubhc and permanent teachers, men
of mature age and acquirements, and often highly
gifted, the Oxford tuition now fell, from year to
year, into the hands of younger graduates, whether
in the capacity of private tutors or examiners.
Several causes had concurred to accelerate the pro-
motion of college fellows. Their number was still
the same, not having increased with church ex-
tension, and the multiplication of new schools in a

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PUBLIC EXAMINATIONS.

Chap. XIII.

growing population. It consequently became so
difficult in many colleges to choose for tutors, fellows
who were not manifestly too young, that, to remedy
the evil, several heads of Houses wisely permitted
men who had forfeited their fellowship by marriage
to continue as tutors. It would appear, from the
Oxford Calendar for 1835, that no less than seven of
the Colleges, and four of the Halls, have been driven
to this resource. Nevertheless, the majority of the
body of public examiners is often under the age of
thirty, and some of them only twenty-five years old !
They go out of office in succession, after serving for
two years. On this fluctuating body of young men,
responsible to no one for their decisions, whether in
passing students for degrees, or in awarding honours,
a body having the power of modifying at their ca-
price the whole style and tenour of the public
examinations, the direction of academical education
in this great country has practically devolved !

At Cambridge, the collegiate influence has, since
the Reformation, caused the university to pass gra-
dually through nearly all the same phases as at
Oxford. Here, also, the transference of the business
of instruction from the public and permanent to the
collegiate and temporary teacher, has coincided pre-
cisely, in point of time, with greater strictness in
the examinations, and more studious habits and

Chap. XIII.

CAMBRIDGE.

301

better discipline among the undergraduates. It is
natural that, owing to this coincidence, a false notion
should be engendered, that the subdivision of labour
amongst a well organized body of professors is less
effective than the method of college tuition.

It might, perhaps, have been expected that such a
subdivision would have been carried farther at Cam-
bridge, in consequence of more than half the students
being members of two, out of seventeen, colleges;
namely, Trinity and St. John's. These noble founda-
tions contain, each of them, from 400 to 500 under-
graduates, and might almost be regarded, from their
numerical strength, as universities of themselves.
But although the fellowships in both of them are
awarded to merit, the educational functions must
be, comparatively speaking, of secondary importance
to the fellow-tutor ; for, being almost invariably a
clergyman, his highest hope of future preferment is
not in the University, but in the Church. The
proportion of students intending to take orders is
not so large here as at Oxford, and they are not
required to subscribe, on matriculation, any formula
of religious belief, so that Roman Catholics and
dissenters from the Church of England can study
here, and obtain academical honours, though not
degrees. The responsible duty of conducting the
public examinations is even here in the hands of very

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PROFESSORIAL LECTURES Chap. XIII.

young men, though two of the mathematical profes-
sors assist in awarding the Smith's Prize, the liighest
mathematical honour; and the professor of Greek
and the public orator, presumed to be a first-rate
Latin scholar, preside in the examination for the
Chancellor's medal for classics.

Very recently at Cambridge, all branches of know-
ledge taught by the professors — in a word, every
subject except what is understood in our universities
by classics and mathematics — have had sentence
of banishment passed upon them in the form of new
compulsory examinations, under the management of
college tutors, the Oxford plan of awarding honours
to classical and mathematical attainments alone
being adhered to. The professors of chemistry and
anatomy, who had formerly considerable classes,
have only mustered six or seven pupils, although
still compelled to give courses of fifty lectures
each. The chairs of Modern History, and of the
Application of Machinery to the Arts, once num-
bering audiences of several hundreds, have been in
like manner deserted. Yet dispensations are rarely
granted for the discontinuance of useless duties, even
when only two pupils present themselves.

Moreover, here, as at Oxford, it is not uncommon
to give such chairs as Mathematics, Natural Phi-
losophy, Chemistry, Botany, Astronomy, Geology,

Chap. XIII. ABANDONED AT CAMBRIDGE.

303

Mineralogy, and others, to clergymen, who combine
tliem with clerical duties, or throw them up when
they obtain preferment, and who, however eminent,
owing, as they must do, a mixed allegiance, partly
to their ecclesiastical order, and partly to the pro-
fessorial body, cannot stand up with heart and
courage in defence of the public, as opposed to the
clerical and collegiate, interests.

Dr. Whewell, now Master of Trinity, after many
years' experience as a tutor at Cambridge, published,
in 1837, his views on the plan of education adopted
in the English universities. His arguments in favour
of employing the learned languages as a main in-
strument of education are unanswerable, and en-
forced with great eloquence and power. " In what
a condition should we be," he observes, "if our
connection with the past were snapped — if Greek
and Latin were forgotten?"* No less cogent are
his reasons for cultivating mathematics as a means
of strengthening the reasoning powers and disci-
plining the mind. But when we come to that part
of his treatise in which he attempts to defend the
exclusive monopoly enjoyed by these subjects in the
education of young men at Oxford and Cambridge,

* Principles of University Education, London, 1837, ch. i.
sect. 4.

304

ADVOCACY OF THE

Chap. XIII.

from the ages of eighteen to twenty-two, inchKling
a period at the end of which tlie majority of them
quit college altogether, his commendations of the
system appear to me rather to resemble the plead-
ings of an advocate, than those enlightened and
philosophical views which characterise his works in
general. Obedience and deference to authority arc
held forth as if they were the chief and almost sole
moral virtues to be instilled into the minds of young
academicians. The students are treated more as
boys and children than as men on the very point of
entering on their several duties in life, and who
ought, without loss of time, to be acquiring habits
of thinking and judging for themselves.

" Mathematical doctrines are fixed and perma-
nent," says the historian of the Inductive Sci-
ences, of whose remarks on this subject I shall
give a brief abstract in his own words. " The
old truths will always be true. In philosophical
doctrines a constant change is going on. The old
system is refuted, and a new one is erected. There
is nothing old, nothing stable. The student cannot
but suspect that his teacher and his teacher's creed
are but for a day. The mind of a young man
employed in attending to teachers of this kind must
fail to acquire any steady conviction of the immutable
and fixed nature of truth. He becomes a restless

ClIAP. XIII.

CAMBRIDGE SYSTEM.

305

speculator, criticising wliat has tilrcady been done in
I)hilosophy, attempting to guess what will be the
next step. He is placed in the position of a critic
instead of a pupil." — " In mathematics, the teacher is
usually the superior of his scholar, who entertains a
docile and confiding disposition towards his in-
structor. He cannot give or refuse his assent Avhen
a system is proposed to him, nor feel in the situation
of an equal and a judge. The subjects suitable for
university teaching are the undoubted truths of
mathematics, and works of unquestioned excellence,
such as the best classical authors. When engaged
in these, the student respects his instructor ; they
are the fit subjects of college lectures. A spirit of
criticism is awakened by the study of philosophy,
which is a fit subject o? jrrofessorial lectures."*

In commenting on the above j^assages, I cannot
refrain from remarking, that if the teacher of phi-
losophy cannot command the respect of his pupils,
he must be ill-qualified for his post. No one who is
master of his favourite science will fiiil to inspire the
minds of his more intellectual scholars with a love
of what he teaches, and a regard and admiration for
their instructor. " Addicti jurare in verba magistri,"
they will be only too prone to prefer Plato to truth,

* University Education, pp. 46 — 53.

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306

CLASSICS AND MATHEMATICS. Chap. XIII.

and defend the professor's theory, even when he
himself has seen reason to modify it in accordance
with new facts and reasonings.

When we inquire by what kind of training young
men can best be prepared, before leaving the uni-
versity, to enter upon the study or practice of their
professions, whether as lawyers, physicians, clergy-
men, schoolmasters, tutors, or legislators, can we
assent to the notion that, by confining instruc-
tion to pure mathematics, or the classical writers,
more especially if the latter are not treated in a
critical spirit, we shall best accomplish this end?
Do not these belong precisely to the class of subjects
in which there is least danger of the student's going
wrong, even if he engages in them at home and
alone ? Should it not be one of our chief objects to
prepare him to form sound opinions in matters con-
nected with moral, political, or physical science ?
Here, indeed, he needs the aid of a trustworthy
guide and director, who shall teach him to weigh
evidence, point out to him the steps by which truth
has been gradually attained in the inductive phi-
losophy, the caution to be used in collecting facts
and drawing conclusions, the prejudices which are
hostile to a fair inquiry, and who, while his pupil is
interested in the works of the ancients, shall remind
him that, as knowledge is progressive, he must avail

Chap. XIII. ENGLISH UNIVERSITY SYSTEM.

307

himself of the latest acquisitions of his own ao-e,
in order to attain views more comprehensive and
correct than those enjoyed even by predecessors of
far superior capacity and genius.

It may appear strange, that while such great
sacrifices of time are made in England to the ex-
clusive cul'ivation of classics, a larger proportion
of the best modern editions of Greek and Latin
authors are not the fruit of British scholarship. The
cause, however, is easily explained. The highest
excellence in literature or in science can only result
from a life perseveringly devoted to one department.
Such unity of purpose and concentration of power
is wholly ineonsistent with our academical machinery
of tuition.

The panegyrists, indeed, of the modern university
system in England, seem never to admit candidly
this plain truth, that the colleges have no alternative
in regard to the course of study open to them.
Take any flourishing university in Great Britain or
on the Continent, Berlin, for example, or Bonn, or
Edinburgh, where a wide range of sciences are
taught. Let the students be divided into fifteen or
more sections, w ithout any classification in reference
to their age, acquirements, talents, tastes, or future
prospects. Assign to each section a separate set of
teachers, chiefly clerical, and looking forward to

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308

ENGLISH UNIVERSITY SYSTEM. Chap. XIII.

preferment in the Church and public schools, and
from them select all your public examiners. Wliat
must be the result ? The immediate abandonment
of three fourths of the sciences now taught, while
those retained will belong of necessity to the less
progressive branches of human knowledge. Under
conditions so singular as those now imposed on Ox-
ford and Cambridge, I am ready to join their warmest
eulogists, and to contend that their plan of education
is the best.

In the treatise on the universities, before alluded to,
there are hints thrown out on the " ignoble influence
of compulsory examinations, which act on the fears
rather than on the hopes of young men," and which
have "drawn off many students from professorial
lectures ; " on " examiners not habitually pursuing
particular studies, and whose knowledge, therefore, has
no fulness, richness, depth, or variety;" also on private
tutors having no ostensible and responsible situation
in the university, and the tendency of modern
changes to throw the whole academical education
into their hands and those of the public examiners
(ibid. ch. ii.) ; which may lead us to infer that the
optimism of the Master of Trinity is not of that un-
compromising kind which should make us despair of
his co-operation in all future academical reforms.

In considering the present state of feeling towards

Chap. XIII. ITS UTILITARIAN TENDENCY.

309

science and its cultivators in England, I cannot re-
frain from citing a passage (with the leave of both the
correspondents) from a letter dated February, 1845,
addressed by Professor Licbig to Mr. Faraday : —

" What struck me most in England was the per-
ception that only those works that have a practical
tendency awake attention, and command respect,
while the purely scientific, which possess far greater
merit, are almost unkno ,vn. And yet the latter are
the proper and true source from which the others
flow. Practice alone can never lead to the discovery
of a truth or a principle. In Germany, it is quite
the ''ontrary. Here, in the eyes of scientific men,
n i *ae, or at least but a trifling one, is placed on
the practical results. The enrichment of science is
alone considered worthy of attention. I do not
mean to say that this is better; for both nations
the golden medium would certainly be a real good
fortune."

What I have said of the method and course of
instruction now pursued in our principal universities
will, I think, explain in no small degree the prevalence
of the utilitarian spirit, so correctly pointed out by
this distinguished foreigner, and the want of a due
appreciation of the higher and more difificult depart-
ments of philosophical research. From what source is
the public at large, whether belonging to the upper or

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PATRONAGE OF SCIENCE.

Chap. XIII.

middle classes, to imbibe a respect and veneration for
those who are engrossed in the pursuit of philosophical
truth, and who live excluded from active life, if they
who direct university education do not foster, nay,
if they positively discourage, the teaching of the pro-
gressive sciences? How can the multitude learn,
that, for one mind willing or capable of patiently
workinj;^- out and discovering a new truth or principle,
there are hundreds who can apply to practice these
principles, when once ascertained ? Nothing can be
more short-sighted, therefore, even on purely utili-
tarian grounds, than the usual policy of the herd of
cui bono philosophers, who award higher honours and
emoluments to the application than to the discovery
of scientific principles.

It is truly fortunate that, in proportion as Oxford
and Cambridge have withdrawn their countenance
more and more from studies connected with physical
science and natural history, the wants of a high state
of civilisation, and the spirit of the age, have afforded
to them in England an annually increasing patronage.
It is felt that astronomy is indispensable to navigation,
chemistry to agriculture and various arts, geology to
mining, botany to medicine, and so of other depart-
ments. If the practical connection of any branch of
science be not obvious, as in the case of zoology,
scarcely any encouragement is given to it in any

ft.

Chap. XIII.

ACADEMICAL REFORM.

311

English place of education ; but even here, fortunately,
the British Museum and the College of Surgeons,
by their extensive collections, step in, and in some
degree supply the deficiency.

After the rejection at Oxford of the moderate
measure of reform proposed in 1839, for combining
together the professorial and tutorial systems, we can
scarcely hope that any movement from within will
effect [the changes so loudly called for. Time will,
year after year, remove the older members of Con-
vocation, who are favourable to more enlarged views,
and will replace them, it must be feared, by the
avowed partizana of the narrower system of study,
adopted in more modern times, and under which
they have been brought up. Appeal under such
circumstances must therefore be made to an external
authority. A royal commission like those which
have moi'e than once visited of late years the
universities of Scotland, might prove a sufficient coun-
terpoise to the power and vis inertixB of forty learned
corporations. They might suggest such remedies as
tlie licensing of new Halls, the removal of tests on ma-
triculation, the awarding of honorary distinctions for
proficiency in the subjects of the professorial lectures,
and many others, which would doubtless be welcomed
by the more enlightened members of Convocation.
Fortunately, no violent innovations are called for, no

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CnA.P. xiir.

new endowments, or grants of money. The com-
missioners would have to recommend the renovation
of what has fallen into disuse — the improvement of
the old rather than the introduction of new and
experimental systems ; they would have to give force
to existing academical statutes, now inoperative,
rather than to enact new laws. They might under-
take university reform in the temper recommended
by Dr. Whewell (p. 138.), " bringing to the task a
spirit, not of hatred, but of reverence for the past,
not of contempt,, but of gratitude towards our pre-
decessors." No new fountains of knowledge are to
be sought for in the depths of the earth ; they are
already at the surface, ready, on the removal of im-
pediments, to overflow and fertilize the soil. When
Lord Hastings conquered Delhi in 1817, he found
an extensive wilderness near that city, sterile, and
parched up by the sun's heat, which had once been
cultivated and populous ; for in ancient times it had
been irrigated by canals which brought the waters of
the Jumna from a distance of 250 miles. The
empire which had left these monuments of its ancient
grandeur had long passed away, and having fallen to
pieces, ^ad formed a multitude of smaller kingdoms,
each governed by feebler rulers. In a few years,
by the aid of several thousand labourers, directed by
skilful engineers, these ancient watercourses were

Chap. XII L

ey. The com-
thc renovation
improvement of
n of new and
ve to give force
'W inoperative,
y might uncler-
: recommencled
to the task a
e for the past,
)wards our pre-
jwledge are to
arth ; they are
removal of im-
le soih When
1817, he found
ty, sterile, and
had once been
it times it had
t the waters of
' miles. The
s of its ancient
iving fallen to
Her kingdoms,
a few years,
rs, directed by
rcourses were

Chap. XIII.

EXCLUSIVE SYSTEM.

313

repaired. They had been dry for two centuries and a
half; and on the day appointed for the copious streams
to flow once more through the streets of the ancient
metropolis, the Hindoo priests went forth in solemn
procession, while troops of virgins threw garlands of
flowers into the waters as they advanced. It was a
day of national jubilee and thanksgiving, for the hand
of a foreign power had restored to them the works of
their forefathers.

But our ancient seats of learning, it will be said,
so far from being depopulated, are full to overflowing.
Oxford annually refuses to admit new students, be-
cause more cannot be accommodated within the college
walls. Doubtless, the colleges are full, but can this be
said of the university ? Have Oxford and Cambridge
kept pace, since the commencement of the present cen-
tury, with the growth of the population, wealth, and
desire of education, in the British empire ? So many
millions have been added to our population, that the
clergy have, of necessity, increased in number, and the
English bishops have more generally required aca-
demical degrees before ordination. This alone has
caused a considerable augmentation of students. But is
it not notorious that the expensive style of living, and
the exclusion of branches of instruction connected
with the future professions and individual tastes of
students, have kept down the number of academicians ?

VOL. I. p

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EXCLUSIVE ACADEMICAL

Chap. XIII.

The sons of the aristocracy, and future divines, who,
if poor, may eke out their academical income with
scholarships and other endowments, constitute the
mass of the undergraduates. The colleges have no
desire to multiply the number of their pupils ; they
have ah'eady as many as they can teach. The
academical fees, and the cost of board and lodging,
are very reasonable ; but the style of living is so high,
that students with small incomes feel themselves in
a false position ; and this objection has operated far
more than religious tests to check the natural in-
crease of the universities.

Why, it may be asked, should we crowd all the
British youth into two ancient seats of learning?
Why not promote the growth of other institutions
in London, Durham, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland?
That such competition should be encouraged, I fully
admit ; but it will still be desirable that Oxford and
Cambridge should expand freely, and that they
should cease to serve as models of an exclusive and
sectarian principle. Before the Reformation their
spirit was catholic and national : since that period,
they have dwindled, not into theological seminaries,
for they have never in practice afforded a complete pro-
fessional course for divinity students, but into places
for educating the clergy of the Established Church,
and the aristocratic portion of the laity professing the

Chap. XIII.

re divines, who,
5al income with
constitute the
colleges have no
eir pupils ; they
n teach. The
'd and lodging,
iving is so high,
A themselves in
las operated far
the natural in-

i crowd all the
;s of learning?
:her institutions
8, and Ireland?
Duraged, I fully
hat Oxford and
and that they
1 exclusive and
Formation their
Lce that period,
ical seminaries,
a complete pro-
but into places
)lished Church,
y professing the

Chap. XIII.

SYSTEM OF ENGLAND.

315

same form of Christianity. Such a system, coupled
with the abandonment of professional studies in ge-
neral, tends to dissever throughout the country men
of different callings, creeds, and professions. It has a
dissociating influence. It separates during the period
of youth the nobility and gentry from the higher por-
tion of the middle classes, the barrister from the
attorney, the physician from the surgeon, the legis-
lators and lawyers of England from those civilians
to whom the government of eighty millions in India
is to be consigned, the members of the Anglican
church from the Romanists of Stonyhurst or the
Dissenters of Hackney, the civil engineers of Putney
from the medical students of London. It disunites
these and other sections of the same community, and
throws them into antagonist masses, each keeping
aloof from the other in cold and jealous seclusion,
each cherishing sectarian or party animosities, or
professional and social prejudices. Complaints are
often heard, and not without reason, of the harsh
outlines that often separate the different grades of
society in this country. It is in the season of youth,
and when men are engaged in the common pursuit of
knowledge, — especially if allowed as far as possible to
follow the bent of their own tastes and genius, — that
friendships might easily be formed tending to soften
these hard outlines. At college, they would be

'ii

* .'.ii"

316

ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES.

Chap. XIII

brought together on neutral, and usually on friendly
ground, where kindly feelings and sympathies woul(|
spring up spontaneously, and would be cherished ini
after-life by congenial souls, however distant the sta-
tion, or distinct the religious opinions or professional
employments of the former fellow-students.*

♦ While these sheets were passing through the press, an im
portant discussion look phiee in the House of Commons, in con-!
sequence of a motion made April 10th, 1845, by Mr. Christie,!
M. P. for AVeymouth, for a royal commission of enquiry intoj
the state of education in the English universities. I have
added and altered nothing since reading this debate, and it
will be seen that while there is a coincidence in some of ray
views with those so ably advocated by many of the parlia-
mentary speakers, there are other grounds taken up by me
to which they have not alluded. \

V\:

. .•.

I .

■A It

END OF THE FIRST VOLUME.

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Lyell, C.

Travels in North America

CARLETON

UNIVERSITY

LIBRARY