146 NATURAL SCIENCE. Feb.. 



should have doubted it, to inform the reader that concentric signifies 

 " having one common centre " ; but surely even the most benighted 

 of " general readers " knows what oval means. If he does not he 

 will not get very accurate information from Mr. Badenoch, who 

 considers that it is the equivalent of " oblong " ! 



Pitches et Chasses Zoologiques. Par le Marquis de Folin. Bibliotheque 

 Scientifique Contemporaine. Pp. 330, 117 figures. Paris: J. B. Bailliere et 

 Fils, 1893. Price 3fr. soc. 

 This is a charming little book on natural history, illustrated by quaint 

 pen and ink sketches of animals, places, and apparatus. It is designed 

 evidently to interest the amateur in the familiar objects of the animal 

 world, and to guide him in the methods of looking for and capturing 

 animals and plants. The reader is first taken to the sea-shore, and 

 when he has spent an hour at the limits of the receding tide, his whetted 

 curiosity is taught to satisfy itself with drag-nets and tow-nets. 

 Thereafter he works his way through Algae and Fungi and Flowering 

 Plants, and then up through the animal kingdom from Infusoria to 

 Mammals. Excursions to the bottom of the sea, discussions of 

 phosphorescence and of animal electricity, enliven his progress, and a 

 great deal of accurate classification and external anatomy is adminis- 

 tered to him in gentle doses. A special and most valuable feature is 

 that the book deals, so far as possible, with exact places, the special 

 features of which are described, and the animals which may be found 

 there specially mentioned. It is a book to be commended to local 

 natural history societies for its method and treatment. 



Outline of the Geology and Physical Features of Maryland, with a 

 coloured geological map of the State and 16 plates and charts. By Professor 

 G. H. Williams and Dr. W. B. Clark. 4to. Pp. 67. Baltimore : Johns 

 Hopkins Press, 1893. Price $1. 



This is an extra edition of the description of the Physical Geography 

 and Geology of Maryland recently prepared for the World's Fair 

 Book on the State's resources. It embraces the topography, climate, 

 geology of the plateau, mountain and plain, and a brief account of 

 the distribution of mines and minerals. This text is illustrated by a 

 new geological map of Maryland, six coloured charts to show the dis- 

 tribution of rainfall and temperature, and ten full-page plates of 

 various types of scenery having a topographic or geological signifi- 

 cance. 



The map, which is on a scale of 1:500,000, approximately eight 

 miles to the inch, represents in twenty-nine colour distinctions the 

 present state of our knowledge of Maryland's geology, and the har- 

 monious arrangement of these colours renders it a most pleasing 

 specimen of chromo-lithography. It is based upon the work of 

 Tyson, I. C. White ,Geiger, Keith, Darton, and G. H. Williams, and 

 contains much information never before published. It is accom- 

 panied by a tabulation of the soils belonging to the different geological 

 formations by Professor Milton Whitney. 



The work may prove of some general interest, since the State of 

 Maryland contains geological formations in almost unbroken sequence 

 from Archaean to Recent. The ancient crystalline and semi-crystal- 

 iine rocks of the Piedmont plateau appear to be metamorphosed rocks 

 of Archaean, Cambrian, and Ordovician age. Fossils, it is true, have 

 not been found, neither is there any direct evidence of their sedimen- 



