Book Description

Excerpt from An Elementary Course of Geology, Mineralogy, Physical Geography, Vol. 1 best to begin at the very threshold of science, and explain the fundamental laws by which all changes are effected. He has enlarged much more on Physical Geography than in his former works, treating it now as a special subject; and has introduced an entirely now division - endeavouring to give a useful account of the materials of the earth, as well as of the arrangement of rocks. The first part of the velume thus relates to subjects which are barely mentioned in his former book. In Descriptive Geology also he has dwelt much on the structure and composition of rocks, and but little on fossils - partly, because he believes the former subject both more neglected and more practically useful than the latter, and partly because he was unwilling to repeat what he has already elsewhere published at some length. The remainder of the Descriptive Geology, and the chapters on Practical Geology, are, for the most part, adapted and abridged from the work already alluded to, but the matter is re-arranged, and some very important portions are altogether new. These, again, have chiefly a practical tendency. The Author has endeavoured throughout to avoid unnecessary discussion, and confine himself strictly to facts. He has not failed to avail himself of such means of information as were at his disposal, and, amongst other works, has to confess great obligations to JohnBton's (Berghaus') "Physical Atlas," the recent works of Humboldt, and the publications of Sir C. Lyell, in the first division; - to the treatises on Mineralogy by M. Dufiresnoy, and Mr. Dana, in the second division; - and to Macculloch's " Treatise on Rocks," the "Memoirs of the Geological Survey of Great Britain," and Mr. R. C. Taylor's valuable work on the "Statistics of Coal," in the descriptive and practical divisions of his subject. The illustrations in this volume are, with the exception of some diagrams, selected from Beudant's "Cours Elementaire de Geologic," and the mineralogical part of Begnault's "Chimie." They are printed from casts obtained from the publisher of those works. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.