Abstract
When I was ordered to Beaune and was placed in charge of teaching the mineralogy there, in the American Expeditionary Forces University, there were no minerals and no text-books available for the class. Some “Lefax” folders (9–22 and 9–48) arrived by first-class mail before we finished, however; and owing to the kindness of M. A. Changarnier, Officer of Public Instruction and Conservator of the fine Museum at Beaune, and of Prof. J. Blagac, of the University of Dijon, who presented and loaned to us an extensive series of minerals, including some fine specimens, we were able to get along. I also obtained a set from Stuer of Paris, who is to France what English of Rochester is to this country, before we left. Practically no government requisitions came thru in the brief three months of the existence of the Beaune university. There was therefore a fine chance to illustrate makeshifts, such as a blowpipe made of two clay pipes; a lens used as a burning glass to test fusibility; broken porcelain electric fixtures as streak plates; etc. But great emphasis was naturally laid on physical characters, and especially the associations, i.e., the paragenesis of the minerals. By using specimens that had several minerals on them, we did not need to borrow so many; and as every mineralogist knows, the association of a mineral as for instance staurolite with metamorphic rocks, is a thoroly reliable means of identifying it. We were located near enough to five different kinds of mines to reach them on our excursions. Beaune, located on the edge of the Jurassic limestones, and of the deposits of a Pliocene lake, and within a few miles of both the coal measures and the granites of the Morvan district, was not a bad place for our work.
