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��the Albany medicnl collie in 1838, and was afterward traQsferrtd to the profesaorahip of obstetrics, bis connection with the college con- tinuing until 1852.
Dr. Emmons's chief claim to remembrance lies in his work as a geologist. A favorite pupil of Professor Amos Eaton, he soon be- came ioterested in the mineralo- gy and geology of the western part of Massa- chusetts, and the adjacent re- gion of the state of New York. Appointed pro- fessor of natural history at Wil- liams college in 1S33. he held that position till 185!), when he became profes- sor of mioeralo- gy anil geolt^y, an office which he held until his death in 1863.
His appoint- ment as geolo- gist of the sec- ond district of llie geological 8ur\-ey of New York in Julj-, 1836, gave the
opportunity for the exercise of his power of acute obaen'atioM in the field, which made hia great reputation as a geologist. In 1837 Dr. Emmons first named, described, and classified the celebrated ' Potsdam sandstone.' In 1842 he pointed out a great system of stratified rocks under the Potsdam, which he called the ' Ta- conic system.' Two years later Dr. Emmons
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��following very wiiirteoua manner : ■' In compar- ing these dates, it is clear that Dr. Emmons was the first to announce the existence of a fauna anterior to that which bad been estab- lished in the ' Silurian sj-stem * as characteriz- ing the ' lower Silurian ' division, and which I have named the second fauna. It is, then, just to recognize this priority, and I think it all the more fitting to state it at this time, that it baft not hitherto been claimed." At a later date Emmons pub- lished further details, and de- scribed several other primordial fossils in bis ' American ge- ology' and ■ Manual of ge- oI(^ in 1855 and 1859.
The following familiar names, divisions, and classifications, of the paleozoic rocks of New York, are also due to Emmons: Chazy lime- stone, black marble of Isle la Motto, Lorrain eliales, Cbam- plain group. Ontario group, Helderberg series, and Erie group.
In 1851 Dr. Emmons was appointed state geologist of North Carolina. Hia discoveries in the coal-measures of Deep and Dan rivers, of a splendid triassic Bora, with old vertebrates, such as fishes, saurians, and finally of the oldest
���first described the primordial fauna, preceding mammal (Dromatherium sylvestre) yet found, the celebrated discoveries of Barrandc, who not only in America, but in the whole world, recognized Emmons's right of priority in the are justly counted among the most imiwrtanl
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