29* Reviews, and Notices respecting New Books. 



by the very interesting geological situation of this metropolis. Placed 

 in the centre of a rich coal-field, and yet on the edge of the great 

 range of the oolites, and within a few miles of the cretaceous downs 

 of Wiltshire, on the one side, and the transition chains of the 

 Quantocks and Exmoor on the other; we have, taking Bristol as a 

 centre, within a circle of thirty miles, every geological formation, 

 from chalk to transition slate. Every walk through the lovely dales 

 which diversify our scenery, is as rich in geological interest as in 

 picturesque beauty ; and we may hope to open to our readers a 

 new and copious source of instruction and pleasure in their daily 

 excursions." 



The means for the cultivation of Zoological science afforded by 

 the Museum of the Bristol Institution, and the advantages which 

 its laboratory and apparatus afford for the repetition of experiments 

 and the prosecution of original researches, in Chemistryand in Elec- 

 tricity, are also enumerated among the circumstances connected 

 with the establishment and expected support of this Journal; it 

 being undoubted by the Editor, " that the city where, in his early 

 life, Davy started as the assistant of Beddoes, will again yield an 

 efficient supply of labourers in the advancement of science." The 

 Address concludes with a statement of the objects of the work with 

 respect to Literature, on which, however, it is not our province to 

 enlarge. 



Entertaining the best wishes for the success of the West of En- 

 gland Journal, and concurring altogether in the propriety of its 

 establishment, on the grounds which we have noticed, we may 

 now take a view of its contents. The first part of the Number, 

 devoted to Science, commences with an " Essay Introductory to 

 Geology, by the Rev. W. D. Conybeare." This contains, in suc- 

 cession, a sketch of the order of geological formations, and of the 

 organic remains which they present, with a concise tabular view of 

 the inferior, secondary, and tertiary rocks, a notice of the disloca- 

 tions and disruptions which appear to have affected the strata, and 

 a statement of the more obvious inferences of theoretical geology. 

 In his next communication, (to appear in the second or April 

 Number,) Mr. Conybeare will proceed to the local facilities which 

 the neighbourhood of Bristol presents to the study of geology. 

 Mr, Conybeare's synoptical table of formations is a modification 

 of part of that given by him in the " Outlines of the Geology of 

 England and Wales:" he makes the following remarks on the asso- 

 ciation of the carboniferous group with the transition class of 

 rocks : 



" With these [the transition rocks] it is clear that the carboni- 

 ferous series of rocks must, from the close generic relation of their 

 organic remains, both animal and vegetable, be associated as the 

 upper group of the same order. The anthracite, or culm alternat- 

 ing with the roofing slates of North Devon, is in fact a true grau- 

 wacke coal -formation, and closely agrees in the relics of vegetables 

 which it exhibits, with the great coal formation*." (p. 4.) 



* See our Number for January, p. 67. 



