In addition to this physical impossibility, the work of
the present year was entered upon under circumstances very unfavorable
for making any great progress. The law under which they have acted was
passed at the last period of a protracted session, when nearly half
of the season during which working parties can be kept in the field
had elapsed; and although no delay took place in the appointment of
commissioners to carry it into effect, the organization of the board was
not effected, in consequence of the refusal of one of the commissioners
and the agent to accept of their nomination. The commissioners, acting
under these disadvantages, have done all that lay in their power to
accomplish the greatest practicable extent of work, and have obtained
many results which can not but be important in the examination of the
vexed and important question which has been committed to them; but after
having fully and maturely considered the subject and interchanged the
results of their respective operations they have come to the conclusion
that it would be premature to embody the partial results which they have
attained in a general report for the purpose of being laid before the
political and scientific world.
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