2:M the AMERICAN MONTHLY [July 



eral)lc component piirt ol beds of gTcat thickness in past 

 ag-es. Beneath the Atlantic coastal plain there has been 

 continuously traced a marine Miocene bed from Asbury 

 Park, N. J., to Richmond and Petersburg-, Va. It out- 

 crops along- the deeply-cut creek banks about Richmond, 

 and underlies the town. It occurs between the depths of 

 16 and *J5 feet at Asbury Park, between the depths of 400 

 and 700 feet at Atlantic City, N. J., and between the depth 

 of 400 and 800 feet at Crisfield, Md. Its maximum thick- 

 ness, so far as yet known, is therefore 300 to 400 feet. At 

 Richmond, however, it is but about 25 feet thick. 



A fresh water deposit, of Pliocene ag-c, underlies the 

 Llano Estacado or Staked Plains of Texas, an area several 

 times larg-er than Pennsylvania. Lkwis Woolmax. 



MICUOiCOrKA^ NOTES. 



Crystals from MuUer's Fluid.-- As an object for the 

 study of embryology, this slide [of fetal tissues hardened 

 in MuUer's fluid, and mounted through clove oil into l)en- 

 zole-balsam] is good ; but look at it with your polariscope 

 and toll the rest of us what these beautiful crystals are, 

 which stud the entire surface of the mount. They evi- 

 dently do not belong to the fetal hand, for they are diffused 

 throughout the mounting- fluid. If the ])reparer, after 

 hardening- in MuUer's fluid, omitted to wash out the 

 bichromate of jiotash from his object, these needles are 

 bichromate of i)otash crystals. They have a somewhat 

 riioml>ic form, which is what would be ex])ected. 



IL. M. l\ 



Sonorous Sand from Hawaii. — The prv-senl writer has 

 recently received from Dr. Benj. Sharp, wlio, with Prol. 

 Libbcy, visited the Sandwich Islands during the sumnui- 

 and fall of 1893, some of this same sonorous sand. It was 

 obtained from a dune facing the b^'ach upon the island of 

 Kauai. Geologically tlie island is the oldest of the group, 

 having been first formed; it is the only one of the islands 

 on which dunes occur. All of the islands are of volcanic 

 oriirin. 



