290 CJironicIes of Science. [April, 



Tlie Cit}^ of Manchester is determined to be to tlie fore. It is 

 proposed to extend Owen's College into a University, under the 

 title of " Manchester and Owen's College." A large sum (80,000/.) 

 is already secured, and the buildings are planned. "What will 

 Government do ? They have, by the mouth of one of their chief 

 members, intimated that they could do nothing. We are desirous to 

 record that Mr. W. Boyd Dawkms, M.A., F.li.S., of the Geological 

 Sm-vey, whose researches in Fossil Mammalia of the Quaternary 

 Period are so well known, has been appointed to the chair of 

 Natural History at Manchester. Mr. Dawkins, it will be remem- 

 bered, was the first Burdett-Coutts' Scholar at Oxford. 



The Museum of the City of Manchester undoubtedly possesses 

 the finest collection of fossil botanical specimens ever brought 

 tooether in illustration of the Flora of the Coal Period, by Edward 

 W. Binney, Esq., F.Pt.S., F.G.S., wdio has devoted so many years 

 of his Hfe to this branch of geological inquiry. 



The Geological Society of Glasgow have just recently issued 

 Fasciculus I. of their quarto Transactions, Palaeontological Series. 

 It consists of a Monograph by Mr. Thomas Davidson, F.Pi.S., 

 " On the Upper Silurian Brachiopoda of the Pentland Hills, and 

 of Lesmahagow, in Lanarkshire;" and contains descriptions of 

 twenty-six species belonging to thirteen genera of Upper Silurian 

 Brachiopoda from the Pentland Hills, and a single species of Lin- 

 gida (L. minima), and an uncertain species of BhynclioneUa, 

 from Lesmahagow. They are illustrated by the author, with his 

 accustomed skill, in three very beautiful plates. This publication, 

 which is started for the express purpose of illustrating Scottish 

 fossils, deserves to be supported by all who take an interest in 

 North British Pala3ontology. 



Mr. A. Keith Johnson, F.K.G.S. of Edinburgh, has published 

 a small quarto Physical Atlas (price 12s.), for the use of schools. 

 From the glance we took of it, we were favourably impressed 

 with its neat, clear, and attractive appearance. The maps are 

 coloured to show regions of winds, currents, snow-lines, geological 

 formations, geographical distribution of plants and animals ; in fact, 

 on a smaller scale, all that the larger foho Atlas teaches. One map 

 is devoted to illustrations (drawn by A. Geikie, Esq., F.R.S., &c.) 

 of geological features of land ; sections of various formations illus- 

 trating fiiults, anticlinal and synclinal curves, glaciers, volcanoes, and 

 all the other plienomcna Avhicli are treated of in this branch of 

 natural science. 



Mr. Scrope, in a communication to the ' Geological Magazine,' 

 vol. v., p. 537, "On the supposed Internal Fluid it}" of the Earth," 

 ol)serves, " I am gratified to find that the views J entertained and 

 pu])lished, more than forty years ago, as to the nature and modus 

 operandi of the subterranean agents of change in the earth's crust 



