Transcribe Notice of the Ward cabinets...the University of Rochester (1863)

10 CABINET OF MINERALOGY.

Magnetism, on Specific Gravity, on Cohesion, and on Taste and Odor.

1. Among the specimens illustrating the effect of Light on minerals appear many varieties of Lustre, - metallic, vitreous, resinous, pearly, & c.; - of Color, - metallic, non-metallic, play of colors, opalescene, &c., - of Diaphaneity, - transparency, translucency, &c.; - of Refraction, of Polarization, and of Phosphorescence.

2. Here are a small number of specimens which manifest several kinds of Electrical properties, and different degrees of Magnetic force.

3. Under the head of Specific Gravity are arranged a number of minerals so chosen as to give a scale of difference in weight for like volume.

4. The characters of minerals due to Cohesion are shown by a series giving the scale of hardness, - from Talc to Diamond; another, the State of Aggregation, - brittle, sectile, malleable, friable, elastic, &c.; - and finally the varieties of Fracture, - conchoidal, even, hackly, &c.

5. In this final series are shown the properties of Taste and Odor, as exhibited by a number of soluble mineral species.

The specimens which compose the Physical Series, as above described, will attract the attention of the visitor to the Cabinet, by their peculiar choiceness and the almost endless variety of their colors, forms, and general external appearance. A study of this series will be of much importance to the student commencing this science, as a full acquaintance with these external characters of minerals will enable him to recognize at first sight, and with considerable certainty, a large portion of the many species known to science.

                               II. - CHEMICAL SERIES. 

This series contains a limited number of specimens, which are arranged as follows:

1. Such of the "simple elements" of chemists as in their free or uncombined state constitute mineral species.

2. A series of natural specimens, illustrating some of the more prominent modes in which the constituent elements of minerals are combined.

3. Some instances of Isomorphism, and of Dimorphism.