568 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



of the Teeth and Cranial Bones. Reprinted from 

 the "Philadelphia Medical Times." Pp.4. And 

 The Perimetric Dimension System. A General 

 System of Measurement for Urethral, Uterine, 

 Rectal, and other Instruments, and an Adapt- 

 able Metric Gauge. By Charles H. Thomas, 

 M. D. Philadelphia. Pp. 4. 



Percy's Pocket Dictionary of Coney Island. 

 With Map and Illustrations. New York: F. 

 Leypoldt. 1880. Pp. 120. 10 cents. 



Graded Selections for Memorizing. By John 

 B. Peaslee, A. M., Ph. D. Cincinnati and New 

 York : Van Antwerp, Bragg & Co. Pp. 192. 50 

 cents. 



The Liberal Ilymn-Book. Edited by Eliza 

 Boardman Burnz. New York : Burnz & Co. 

 1880. 25 cents. 



University of Tokio. The Calendar of the 

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 1879-80. Tokio : Z. P. Maruya & Co. Pp. 163. 



Some Thoughts concerning Education. By 

 John Locke. With Introduction and Notes. By 

 the Rev. R. H. Quick, M. D. London: Cam- 

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Annual Report of the Chief Engineer of the 

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 for the Year 1879. Philadelphia. 1880. Pp.100. 



The Principles of Nature, etc. Also an Ex- 

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 and III. Hammonton, N. J. : A. J. King. 1880 

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POPULAR MISCELLANY. 



The Catskill Mountains. Professor A. 

 Guyot gives, in the " American Journal of 

 Science" for June, the results and a map 

 of the first scientific survey of the Catskill 

 Mountains, which he has undertaken, and 

 with the aid of interested assistants has so 

 far successfully carried out. These moun- 

 tains, though situated in the most populous 

 and civilized part of the United States, and 

 visited every year by thousands, are among 

 the least known in our country. Yet sev- 

 eral features of the group are well calcu- 

 lated to excite the curiosity of the scientific 

 investigator, and to call for a thorough 

 study of its plastic forms. Though a part 

 of the Appalachian system, the range ap- 

 pears in it as an anomaly ; for, while the 

 other Appalachian ranges trend from the 

 southwest to the northeast, the Catskills 

 run at right angles to them, or from the 

 southeast to the northwest. The Catskills 

 also surpass all the neighboring ranges of 

 mountains by two thousand feet of height. 

 Professor Guyot has devoted the summer 

 vacations of seventeen years to their exami- 

 nation. Ilis map represents a surface of 

 about four thousand square miles, of which 

 the mountainous part proper occupies some- 



what more than one half, or about twen- 

 ty-four hundred square miles. The dis- 

 tances and bearings are computed from the 

 points of the triangulation of the Coast 

 Survey along the Hudson Kiver as a base. 

 The mountain region is divided by the Eso- 

 pus Creek into two groups, differing con- 

 siderably in their physical structure, the 

 northern, or Catskills proper, and the south- 

 ern Catskills or Shandaken Mountains. 

 " The northern group, or Catskills proper, 

 between the Esopus and Catskill Creeks, 

 form a massive plateau having the shape 

 of an irregular parallelogram, extending 

 from southeast to northwest, and shut up 

 between two high border chains, ten or fif- 

 teen miles distant from each other, running 

 about in the same direction. The southwest 

 border is formed by what may be called the 

 central chain of all the Catskills, the other 

 by the northeast border chain. The south- 

 east end is closed by the short chain of the 

 High Peak ; the northwestern by the high 

 swell of plateaus which divide the head- 

 waters of the Delaware and Susquehanna 

 from those of the Schoharie Creek and the 

 Hudson. Inside of this highland, three sec- 

 ondary ranges, starting from the northeast 

 border chain and running nearly west, al- 

 most to the foot of the central chain, fill 

 the inner space, inclosing deep valleys in 

 which flow the waters of the Schoharie 

 Creek and its tributaries. ... A striking 

 peculiarity of the plastic forms of the north- 

 ern Catskill group is, that while its western 

 end is, as it were, buried in the general 

 plateaus of western New York, its moun- 

 tains rising but moderately above their sur- 

 rounding base, its eastern end stands iso- 

 lated on three sides by deep and broadly 

 open valleys, projecting, in all its height, 

 as a mighty promontory, to within ten miles 

 of tide-water in the Hudson River." The 

 very base of its mountains rarely exceeds 

 six hundred feet above tide. " No wonder, 

 then," says Professor Guyot, "that the as- 

 pect of the Catskills is nowhere more im- 

 posing than from the Hudson River and 

 the surrounding lowlands, from which their 

 whole height is seized at a glance, and that 

 it has been thus far believed that the high- 

 est points were found among the mountains 

 of the eastern end." The panorama of the 

 mountains, as seen from Catskill village, is 



