A State Survey for Massachusetts

How to get the most out of this dear old earth in our time and for our time, this is the ever-present question of all ages. To it our century has given some new answers: it has shown new methods of getting old fruits ; it has found rich fruits where once there seemed only barrenness; and it has organized its methods of search into the scheme called a survey. The survey is distinctly the product of this century, and, like most of its products, not yet defined in its shape; it has grown out of varying needs, and has various ways of gaining its ends. Men have hardly begun to study its aims and methods in any general fashion. Is a new world to be explored, or an old empire to be studied more closely than before? For either of these objects certain scientific men are brought together : first, by general consent, the geologist; then students of special departments, — zoölogists in their kind, ethnologists, topographers to map in a general or special way, sketchers and photographers to retain pictures of the surface. All these make collections which more or less completely represent, for future study, the face of nature, and her history in the given region. In this work there is one of the great ideas of our time: the idea that man depends on all things, — that nothing is too minute or base to have its influence on his fate and to command his interest. A century ago men precipitated themselves on the wilderness like new-landed savages, getting their knowledge by hard knocks. To-day science reconnoiters for a thousand miles in front of the wave of immigration. Trained men, guarded by columns of troops, or oftener unprotected, explore the wilderness, and the backwoodsman may follow their trail with folio volumes of facts, when his turn comes. While Hayden with his score of coadjutors is skirmishing over the unexplored recesses of the West, reconnoitering an empire in a season, the surveyors of Great Britain are patiently unriddling their islands at a rate that will require a century for its completion.

It must not be supposed because these two kinds of workers differ so widely in their methods that either is mistaken. Each is doing legitimate work in its sphere, and each has its important scientific and economic results. The object of the first kind of survey is exploration; it seeks to determine the general history of a country: the mountain chains, the rivers, the valleys, the character of the geology, and the limits of the geological formations. This class of work had its beginning in military expeditions, when the aim was to determine the character of a country with reference to the questions of transportation of armies and the application of military force. Scientific research was gradually added, and as the survey work became the only object, the military element became less and less conspicuous. Perhaps the best specimen of this system of reconnoissance work which has ever existed is now in operation in this country, under the charge of Dr. Hayden; other expeditionary surveys, under the charge of Mr. Clarence King and Major Powell, have shared with Hayden the task of unraveling the complicated geology and topography of the vast area lying between the eastern and western borders of the Cordilleras of North America. The present system pursued by Hayden is admirably suited to secure the most rapid delineation of a country for correct sketch maps. A system of triangles is carried across country from mountain - top to mountain-top, so that a large number of positions are accurately determined. From good points of view the topographer delineates the intermediate country by the use of the theodolite; contour lines, or lines supposed to represent equal heights above a water level, are sketched in with some detail, so that the eye catches the true reliefs of the country. Along with these topographical parties go geologists and collectors of specimens, to illustrate the geology and biology of the country. This survey is carried on at such speed that in a season of four or five months a single party will work in several thousand square miles of territory and obtain a remarkably good idea of all its important features. Several of such parties together make up the expedition, and the reports set forth, with a fair accuracy, the topography, geology, zoölogy, botany, agricultural resources, and such information as can be gained concerning the climatology of the district surveyed. It is difficult to imagine a plan better calculated than this to accomplish the end in view, namely, to discover the general characters of an unexplored land, and to guide the coming immigrant in its development by the steady light of science.

Let us now compare this eminently American survey with another work, happily also American, which differs from it in many respects. In the coast survey we have probably the most successful scientific organization, measured by all standards, that any country can show. For fifty years, with means that are relatively small, they have uninterruptedly and rapidly pursued the difficult task of determining with the utmost accuracy the coast features of the United States. In this task the cursory methods that are fittest in the survey of the Territories can find no place. In the topography of the shore every point must be given with absolute truth; nor can the delineation stop when the shore meets the sea; every feature of its shoaler depths must be studied with even greater closeness than the land. All this work rests upon a system of longitude determinations and triangulations extended from the most carefully measured base lines, first by a series of triangles, combined for greater correctness into quadrilaterals, all having the greatest possible length. Where by occupying mountains or building towers these first triangles can be made forty or fifty miles on a side, no pains are spared to accomplish the result. The heliotrope, an instrument for casting sun’s rays with a reflector, serves to signal from mountain-top to mountain-top with wonderful precision. Other series of triangles are formed within this first or primary triangulation, until every part of the region to be mapped has points determined, and marked with signal poles not more than a mile apart. The reader, if any great part of the coast is known to him, must have noticed these signals with their little pennons of white cloth. Each of them marks a point, the relations of which to Greenwich and Washington, and to the equator, have been determined by every means known to science. When the topographer comes to make the map, he brings into the field what is termed a plane table, whereon there is a map sheet, each six inches of which indicate about a mile of the surface he is to represent. He then with his instruments, which from their beautiful adaptation to their work merit a description our space does not permit, gives every important object on its true scale, every road, house, and field; the nature of the ground, whether wooded, tilled, or grassed, swampy or sandy, all these features find a place on the map in signs which explain themselves. The contour of the surface is determined and indicated by red lines for the successive water levels, each twenty feet higher than the preceding, giving a distinct idea of the precise relations and form of every hill and valley on the surface. So accurate are these maps that from them alone any expert person, without seeing the ground, could construct an exact model of the country represented.

When this work is done over the surface of a whole State, as it has been done, or is doing, in some European countries, it gives a perfect basis for all the great operations of the engineer. Is a railroad to be constructed: careful inspection of these maps will show its proper course without preliminary surveys to determine the most practicable route. Are mill powers to be improved, drainage works undertaken, or cities supplied with water: these maps show the drainage areas and the course of water levels. Nor is their use more than begun when this duty is done. Every township, village, or city has endless questions of sewerage, road building, taxation, questions concerning the placing of public buildings, etc., in every one of which such a map is a matter of the utmost importance. Unfortunately this coast survey map is not primarily designed for any such purposes, though there is but one reason why it will not subserve them all; it is its want of extension over any considerable surface. At present it is limited to about a mile or two of the sea border. Intended as it is as a frame for the hydrographic maps, it takes in but enough to furnish the sailor with his “ bearings ” from the land. If we had the coast survey work extended inland over the country as rapidly as the land attained the value given it by high culture, we should have, in time, as fine a national map as could be desired. As it is, the marvelously accurate work of the coast survey stands only as a precious example of what good work is. Congress has already taken what we may hope is the first step in the enlargement of the coast survey, by authorizing the extension of its triangulation over the surface of any State which has provided a topographical and geological survey of its own. If this had been done thirty years ago, it would by this time have had the most profound influence upon the study of American topography; but it comes so late that most of the wealthier States have already spent large sums of money upon more or less considerable failures in the way of local surveys. Massachusetts,New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, in fact, almost every State from Maine to Texas, can point to more or less work done in the name of geology. Some of these surveys have greatly advanced science, but they will all have to be done over again. Those of New York, Ohio, Illinois, and California all deserve to be praised. That of the last-named State is the most creditable piece of finished reconnoissance ever undertaken and carried far towards success within our national limits. It would be a valuable volume that should take up the history of these surveys, show their successes and failures, and recapitulate the gains science has made from them. It is enough for our present purpose to say that the fatal weakness of one and all has been the insufficiency of the topographical maps of the several districts. We have already incidentally considered the value of these maps in the ordinary work of society, as far as the surface is concerned; for the purposes of the geologist, when he has in hand the description of the structure and resources of a country, they are absolutely indispensable. Unless he can trace the limits of formations, the lines of border, and other similar features, with the greatest, nicety, showing where they run with reference to roads, fields, and buildings, he can give nothing of perfection to his records. However accurately he may have observed, his observations must remain a matter of imperfect verbal description, and the work is only temporized with. There is not a single State survey in this country which does not need at the moment to be begun again.

The State of Massachusetts is a remarkably favorable State for illustrating the methods in which a survey should be conducted; not such a survey as a new Western State makes in order to get some idea of where its coal and iron lie, and the amount of its wealth, but a work intended to be the most exact and final work which it is possible to do on the earth’s surface. When a government approaches so considerable an enterprise as this, and determines that it is to be done so as never to require, in our day at least, a reconstruction, all geologists will agree that the first thing is to secure the best map. Massachusetts has the good fortune to have her shore belt map completely made by the coast survey; Cape Ann and Cape Cod and the bordering islands, making, together, about a tenth of the total area of the State, have all been done on the scale of one ten thousandth, or about six inches of map to the mile of distance. If it were practicable, this map should be continued on the same scale over the whole State, making, when finished, a record map about ninety feet long and fifty-four wide; on this scale every important detail could be truthfully laid down. This is the proper thing to dō and nothing but the cost of the work can be urged against it; on this plan the surveying and improvement of private grounds could always be accomplished, tax levies made, in short, our civilization could be organized upon it. If something else less perfect must be done, it will be with the greatest regret that we turn to it from our ideal. On this perfect system the topography alone would be likely to cost over half a million of dollars and pretty certain not to exceed three quarters of a million, or about as much as one thousand feet of the Hoosac Tunnel. Who will say that Massachusetts cannot afford this sum for a perfect record of the theatre of her industries? If, however, it be thought that it is better to temporize with the matter, it will certainly be possible to get the most important results with a smaller original map — one twenty-five thousandth, or about two and a third inches to the mile, will answer for most of the great economic purposes of a survey; it will not, however, serve as a tax map or for the management of individual estates, and in time it would have to be done over on the larger scale. The dimensions of the original maps, it should be noted, is quite another matter from the size they have in their published form; from the original records reductions can be made to any scale.

When this topography is far enough advanced to give a basis for other work, the geology and biology should be taken in hand. Here we come upon a class of researches which require some special consideration. What should be the objects of this scientific work, and how are these objects to be attained? To answer these questions at length is to discuss all the methods and aims of science. There are some limitations, however, which are worthy of note. Any State, however small, furnishes problems organic and inorganic which will require centuries for their complete discussion. As we do not propose that a survey shall take up at once all the problems of science, it becomes a nice matter to limit the work. In the geology this is comparatively easy; no amount of detail consistent with the condition of the science will be superfluous here; every stratigraphical question, every question in chemical geology, should be followed to its utmost point. Each region supplies the investigator with special problems which he knows whenever the general structure of a country is known; it is the special object of a reconnoissance to show what and where these problems are. Some of them are economical, have money in them; the others are economical too, in that higher sense which finds all truth profitable. Of those which connect themselves immediately with industry we may mention the following questions: (1) the distribution of water, its storage and quality; (2) the building-stones of the State; (3) the existence of deposits of coal in workable quantities; (4) the distribution of metals, the iron of the western region, and the silver-bearing beds of the east; (5) the reclamation of marshes; (6) the retimbering of the exposed parts of the coast. Among the scientific problems, the State affords some matters of surpassing interest. Probably no other known fossils have so much value for the science of to-day as those wonderful footprints of the Connecticut Valley. They deserve years of study and the thorough investigation which can only be given by a careful re-survey of the whole region. There is the chance to get from that marvelous stone book records which have the same interest to the student of life in general that the remains of buried Pompeii have for the student of human history. In a few years we shall see these records sought for at the same cost of time and money that the British scientists give to their great bone caves. Under the old survey much was done to make a beginning in this research, but since then the whole aspect of the science of biology has changed. These fossils then were but curious; they now are in the highest sense valuable. Massachusetts has also among her records of the past matters of the highest interest to the geologist; great problems that need not be discussed in detail here are found in the structure of her Berkshire hills. Had the complicated geology of those hills been studied in detail twenty years ago, there would not only have been a notable addition to our knowledge of the laws operative in the building of mountain chains, but the State would probably have been able to act with far more understanding in the making of the Hoosac Tunnel. The writer of this has recently had occasion to make a very careful study of the geology of Hoosac Mountain. It is his firm belief that a due inspection of the surface of that ridge would have disclosed some of the difficulties encountered in the excavation of the tunnel; difficulties which could have been in a large measure avoided, had the engineers been forewarned. It does not seem too much to say that the cost of a complete survey, with a map on the scale of six inches to the mile, might have been saved by this easily gained knowledge. Massachusetts may not build many more great tunnels, — certainly not in her present humor, — but she has a multitude of vast engineering works before her which equally need the information which will be gained from a thorough survey. Another scientific problem which lies before a State survey is the history of that huge, sickle - shaped promontory, Cape Cod. Verily here is a hook on which to hang many questions. Its physical origin, its remarkable value as a barrier between the life of the north and that of the south Atlantic waters, and many other matters deserve investigation. Still another momentous geological question can be better discussed in Massachusetts than elsewhere. Within her borders we have a noble field for the study of the history of the glacial period. There is a special fitness in having the study of this phenomenon carried on here: the world owes the discovery of the facts to one of our most valued citizens; one who, though but an adopted son, gave her the earnest love of a great soul. Louis Agassiz left a noble monument, many monuments, we may say; but it is not to be doubted that this contribution to the history of the earth is his greatest single title to fame. It is fit it should be guarded here.

Among the many problems concerning the existing life of the State, it is difficult to give in a word the most important. A large part of the necessary work for the complete description of our animals and plants is already done, and needs but to be assembled and ordered. The State is already rich in investigators, and as soon as a survey begins, these will be increased; from their labors we may hope for a thorough study of the biology of Massachusetts. The State has already taken advanced ground concerning instruction in natural history. It will greatly aid the work of diffusing a knowledge of nature throughout the people, to have carefully edited catalogues of all the animals and plants existing within the State, with enough concerning their characters, habits, etc., to make the information of practical value to beginners. This work need be very little expense to the survey; the State already has nearly a million of dollars invested in the Museum of Comparative Zoölogy, and in the work of cataloguing the animals this noble institution can make a substantial return through the students it has trained and the collections it has accumulated. Managed with discretion, this survey could not fail to bring about a great interest in science in our public schools of all grades. With good maps and good catalogues of the natural productions of a country, teaching of natural science becomes possible to a degree that cannot be hoped for under other circumstances. This is to Massachusetts a matter of great importance; her real greatness has lain and always must lie in her power to produce men preëminently fitted for the work of their day. Other States can, almost without effort, beat her in the race for material greatness, strive as she may against it; but her intellectual lead, now so clearly established, may be maintained to the end if she but care to take the steps necessary to keep her energies bent towards this object. She must now foster science as she has established and fostered theology and general learning.

In the struggle of the nineteenth century there is no doubt that the material victory is to be to the trained men, those who were trained in their fathers as well as in themselves. The great storehouses of coal and iron of our continent are to yield up their buried forces, and to transform themselves into art, into science, into a wealth that passes all our powers to conceive. Out of our teeming earth are to spring new problems in life which the most far-seeing can scarce yet discern. Measuring by numbers and power, we see the threshold of a century which will dwarf all its forerunners into littleness. Massachusetts must take the lead in matters of science: let her children grow up with the best possible training in all its walks, and they get thereby a certainty of a great future. No one but those professionally employed in teaching geology or biology knows how far the teaching of all the branches of these sciences depends upon the existence of something like an accurate representation of the nature about the student. The writer has found it almost impossible to teach field geology in Harvard College for the want of anything like a proper map of the topography of the region immediately about Cambridge. Such a map, even were the geology quite left out, would double his opportunities for teaching the science. Let us assume that Massachusetts will do this justice to herself and her future, and that a survey is to be organized. Extended and complicated as is this work, there is manifest danger of imperfections in its execution. Most of our geological surveys have been carried on in States where there was little training in science, where the best that could be done was to bring from some other region a trained master and confide the task to him. Here, however, we have a people peculiarly rich in men of spe cial training in science. It is doubtful whether in any other community of the same size, apart from some great capitals of Europe, we can find as many experts in their several walks. It is well to combine their work, or at least to take some measures to secure their wise advice. The best means, as has already been well suggested, would be to have a board modeled on the successful and well-balanced board of education, composed of the scientific men of the State, together with some men more trained in affairs than scientific men are apt to be, which board should represent the diverse interests concerned in such a survey. The secretary of the board should be the executive head of the survey, charged with the responsibility of the business interests, which should be kept apart from the scientific work. Specialists in their several departments should be put in control of the various lines of work, and made responsible in all scientific matters to the board itself. In this way complete efficiency can be secured, together with the fullest expert advice.

In the execution of the work it should not be forgotten that there are fortunately several scientific centres in Massachusetts, and in each, men who are workers in their several fields. If it be found possible, the survey should be so managed as to give strength to the science-teaching at these several schools, by employing their teachers and students in its tasks, and so making them grow with its growth. An accident of the moment has supplied us with a pertinent illustration of the value of a geological survey as a source of advice and criticism in the management of our resources. In the last months of the last year there came the announcement of the discovery of very rich silver mines in the neighborhood of Newbury port; from the newspaper statements we would be entitled to believe that a very remarkable lode had been struck, one that promised returns not unworthy of the dozen greatest silver lodes in the world. What makes the matter more deserving of attention is the unprecedented character of the vein. The series of rocks in which it is found has long been known to carry a certain amount of gold, which in Nova Scotia. Vermont to the northward, and on the east flank of the Appalachian mountain system in Virginia and the Carolinas, has furnished workable quantities of that metal; but we had no reason to expect silver in stores of economic value. There being no competent authority to investigate this matter, the public is likely to remain in substantial ignorance of its merits, even if years go by, until a State survey is begun again. This is particularly unfortunate, for if the facts are as alleged, then there is a source of enormous wealth which should have every aid of unprejudiced experts in its development; if, on the other hand, we have here another of the many clever frauds which have so often juggled men out of their money and made the American name a disgrace, then the best interests of the commonwealth demand a speedy investigation and a complete exposure.¹ In either of these cases, who can doubt that the commonwealth would gain the cost of years of work upon her survey from this single investigation ?

Look at it as we may, measuring its immediate gains to our mines, our fields, our water mills, to our cities in their water supply and sewage, to our railways and common roads, to the interests of each owner of an acre that is to bo improved; or considering the remoter yet not less real economy which is found in increased knowledge of the nature about us, and in the advancement of education, the reasons for this survey are very strong. The commonwealth of Massachusetts has not been wont long to weigh great advantages against small expenditures, so we may safely anticipate her speedy action.

N. S. Shaler.