Civil Engineering.

Professor Emerson.

In this department, practical work in the field forms a prominent, and, as we believe, a somewhat distinctive feature. The use of instruments in the field, by all the students of Civil Engineering, begins with the second term of the first year, and is continued throughout the course. A complete familiarity with the manipulation of all the instruments in common use by engineers and land surveyors, is taught to the students by systematic practice, in the room and in the field. He is made familiar with the chain and all its capabilities; the needle compass, the solar compass, the transit instruments, the leveling instrument, the sextant, the barometer, and the various tools used in drawing and plotting. Saturday and Monday of each week, are devoted to practice in the field, and where necessary, a long time is taken for excursions to the mines, furnaces, bridges and railroad constructions of the country.

The field practice consists of land and railroad surveying, by all the methods in use, or described in the books. Tracts of land, roads and streams are surveyed and plotted; contours of the adjacent country are made with the leveling instrument, the barometer, etc.; railway curves are calculated and set out upon the ground; earthwork is measured and estimated from the embankments and excavations of the railroad. A general system of triangulation of the country about Rolla, is begun from a baseline carefully laid by the students, which will be extended from time to time for their instruction.

Such parts of astronomy as relate to land surveying or engineering, are carefully studied, and are illustrated by stellar and solar observations.

A general course of descriptive engineering, on the basis of Mahan's Civil Engineering, revised by Professor Wood, runs through the second term of the second year.

Gillespie's treatise upon Roads and Railroads, forms one of the studies of the Engineering course.