Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 43.djvu/435

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
LITERARY NOTICES.
421

Springs, which flows into the Madison River. He says that this stream "most nearly fills all the natural requirements." It abounds in suitable water vegetation, as well as in small mollusks and insect larvæ; it is already used as a natural hatchery and spawning ground by trout, whitefish, and grayling; the water never freezes, and, says the assistant commissioner, in making his recommendation, "they are among the most remarkable springs that are to be found in the United States." In the second part of the book Dr. Everman gives a report on his investigations made in Texas for a similar purpose. During this investigation thirty new species of fish were discovered, descriptions of which are given. Many excellent locations for a fresh-water station were found in the interior, but Dr. Everman says that "no point on the coast offers entirely satisfactory conditions for the establishment of a combined fresh and salt water station; but the Swan Lake site, near Galveston, might prove fairly suitable." The reports are illustrated with photographs of the localities investigated and of the fishes inhabiting each locality.

Coals and Cokes in West Virginia is the title of a pamphlet compiled byWilliam Seymour Edwards, which gives, "in a handy form," a more precise knowledge of the coal measures and industry of West Virginia. It consists of a general review of the coal fields, and a series of chapters on their geological, stratigraphical, chemical, and physical condition. The greater portion of the work is devoted to tables of the chemical and physical analyses of the coals and cokes of the State "in comparison with those of other States in America and Europe."

Third Annual Report of the Geological Survey of Texas. E. T. Dumble, F. G. S. A., State Geologist. Austin: Henry Hutchings, 1892. Pp. 410, with maps and illustrations. This report embraces not only the geological and mineralogical conditions of Texas, but also gives some interesting historical facts connected with the development of the State. Accompanying the report are papers on geological investigations in Houston County, by W. Kennedy; Section from Terrell to Sabine Pass; Llano Estacado, or Staked Plains, by W. F. Cummins, notes on the geology of the country west of the plains; Stratigraphy of the Triassic Formation in Northwest Texas, by N. F. Drake; and several other reports dealing with the paleontology of the vertebrata and the cretaceous area, and Trans-Pecos, Texas. A considerable portion of the mineralogical part of the report is devoted to Prof. Dumble's investigations of the coal measures of the State; and in the chapter on Agriculture he explodes the idea that the Staked Plains was a wide expanse of desert sand. They were marked so on all "the old maps as the Great American Desert"; but the State Geologist says, "This has been proved to be utterly untrue, for there are no spots on this wide expanse upon which there was not formerly a luxuriant growth of natural grasses."

In Brochure I of Volume 11 of the Proceedings of the Rochester Academy of Science, Mr. John Walton contributes a paper on the Mollusca of Monroe County. He gives some useful advice to collectors of mollusca, and illustrates his paper with one hundred and thirty-five cuts of as many different varieties and species. Mr. Charles S. Prosser's paper on The Thickness of the Devonian and Silurian Rocks of Western New York, approximately along the Line of the Genesee River, minutely analyses the stratification of the Genesee section. The brochure also contains an article on the Guelph Formation in Rochester, and an interesting synopsis of the proceedings of the botanical section of the academy. (Edited by P. Max Foshay, secretary, Rochester, N. Y., 1892.)

The seventeenth year book of New York State Reformatory at Elmira, January, 1893, is a very exhaustive report of the condition, financial, educational, industrial, etc., of the institution. It was entirely produced by the inmates engaged on the institutional journal. The Summary, and is from the Reformatory press. It is beautifully printed on super-calendered paper and is profusely illustrated. The report of the general superintendent contains a plea for the establishment of "well organized and managed reformatory prisons," and he draws attention to the fact that most of the criminals are the product of "civilization" and "emigration to our shores from the degenerated populations of crowded European marts." In that portion of the book entitled Results there is a very interesting examination into the causes of criminality of certain prisoners, their prog-