Miscellaneous, 73 



* 5. No machinery being required in the manufacture of this 

 paper for the purpose of tearing up the raw material and reducing 

 it to pulp, the expense, both in point of power and time, is far less 

 than is necessary for the production of rag paper. 



* Count Lippe having put himself in communication with the 

 Austrian Government, an Imperial manufactory for Indian corn 

 paper (maislialm papier^ as the inventor calls it) is now in course 

 of construction at Pesth, the capital of the greatest Indian corn 

 growing country in Europe. Another manufactory is already in 

 full operation in Switzerland ; and preparations are being made 

 on the coast of the Mediterranean for the production and exporta- 

 tion on a large scale of the pulp of this new material.'" 



The ancient vegetation of North America. — ^The following 

 general results are selected from an excellent article in Silliman, 

 by Dr. J. S. Newberry : 



1st, The flora of the Devonian and Carboniferous epochs in 

 America, was, in all its general aspects similar to that of the Old 

 World, which has been so fully described ; most of the genera* 

 and a larger number of species than at any subsequent period 

 having been common to the two sides of the Atlantic. The re- 

 lative number of identical species has, however, it seems to me, 

 been somewhat overrated. In many of the species, regarded as 

 the same in Europe and America, the American plants present 

 prevalent or constant characters which may serve to distinguish 

 them. These differences, though frequently remarked by writers, 

 have not been thought to have a specific value ; yet it it quite cer- 

 tain that they are as tangible and important as those which now 

 separate many American and European species of recent plants 

 and recent or fossil animals. I have a conviction that the pro- 

 gress of science will considerably diminish the proportion of 

 identical species ; a closer scrutiny and more extensive comparison 

 of specimens resulting in the discovery of constant, though incon- 

 spicuous characters, which shall be ultimately conceded to be 

 specific. 



It is true, also, that in molluscous palaeontology, recent geology, 

 and botany the number of species common to the two continents has 

 been considerably reduced of late years ; a large number of Ameri- 

 can representatives of European species,at first considered identical 

 for their striking and obvious coincidences, having, on closer study 

 aff'orded constant though less conspicuous differences. 



