March 19, 1896] 



NATURE 



467 



interior of North-East California and the adjacent parts 

 of Oregon, being covered in the interval by Tertiary 

 \ olcanic products. The plain is cut on to the Chico 

 series and older rocks, and there rest on it the lone 

 formation, probably equivalent to the auriferous gravels, 

 the Tuscan tuff, and the Red Bluff Pleistocene beds. It 

 is noteworthy that the plant remains in the oldest of 

 these rocks are of low altitude and not mountain types. 

 There was evidently much movement in post-Chico time, 

 then came erosion during the Eocene, and finally new 

 movement with some warping and deformation. As the 

 Eocene base-level was perfected erosion became much 

 slacker, and was chiefly effected by solution, so that there 

 was left much insoluble and dense material, including 

 quartz and gold, ready to be deposited in the auriferous 

 gravel when the next movement supervened, making the 

 slopes steeper and giving the streams fresh impetus. 



Returning now to the east, we have a lengthy account, 

 by Mr. W. J. McGee, of the Lafayette Formation.^ This 

 writer has shown a remarkable adaptability in suiting 

 his style to his subject, as he expresses it in the follow- 

 ing sentence : " The history of development of the 

 eastern land is recorded in nature in characters so grand 

 that but a small part of a single one may be seen at once, 

 so that the direct reading is difficult." The Coastal 

 Plain of the United States is based on Cretaceous rocks, 

 which are covered by the following rocks in order, the 

 first having an uncomformable base : the Lignitic beds, 

 the Claiborne and Meridian deposits, the Vicksburg- 

 Jackson or White Limestone, the Grand Gulf beds, the 

 Lafayette formation, and the Columbia beds. From this 

 succession the author makes out the chief oscillations 

 and changes in physical geography undergone by the 

 Atlantic slope and the Mississippi embayment. The age 

 of the formation we are left to judge from the following 

 enigmatical sentence. " If the Cenozoic be not made 

 to include the Pleistocene, and if the age be then divided 

 into equal portions called Eocene and Neocene, and if 

 then the Neocene be divided into ten equal parts, the 

 Lafayette period may be supposed to correspond with 

 the eighth or, perhaps, with the seventh or the ninth of 

 these parts." The work closes with an account of the 

 material resources of the formation, soils, siliceous clays, 

 gravel, and iron, followed by the history of events re- 

 corded in the rocks. Mr. McGee illustrates his paper 

 with some excellent maps, and also contributes to the 

 fourteenth Annual Report a geological map of the whole 

 of the United States at present surveyed. 



w. w. w. 



THE GAME FIELDS OF THE EASTERN 

 TRANSVAAL.'^ 



T N proceeding into the interior of Africa from almost 

 -'■ any point on the eastern coast, the traveller passes 

 over a low coastal plain to theToot of the scarp of a high 

 plateau. This plateau is succeeded to the west by a still 

 higher one, which is gained either by a second steep 

 ascent or by a gradual slope. The existing river valleys 

 and former earth-movements have in places interrupted 

 this arrangement ; but, notwithstanding a few such ex- 

 ceptions, it persists with remarkable uniformity from 

 Abyssinia to Natal, where the dominant meridional geo- 

 graphical lines bend round into the east and west series 

 that rules in Cape Colony. In the eastern Transvaal, 

 this zonal arrangement of the country is well developed. 

 Inland from Delagoa Bay is a tract of undulating low- 

 land, ending at the foot of the Libombo Mountains, 



'.Twelfth Annual Report of the Geological Survey of the United 

 States, 1800-91. (1801.) 



- " In Haunts of Wild Game. A Hunter-Naturalist's Wanderings from 

 K.-vhIamba to Libombo. " By Frederick Vaughan Kirby, F.Z.S. Svo. Pp. 

 xvi + 567. With map, portrait, i6 full-page and 24 smaller illustrations. 

 (Kdinburgh and London : Wm. Blackwood and Sons, 1896.) 



which separate Swaziland and the Transvaal from Portu- 

 guese East Africa. Seventy miles further to the west is 

 the parallel range of the Drakensberg or Kahlamba (to 

 adopt the author's spelling of the name, which is usually 

 written Quahlamba). Between these mountain ranges is 

 a belt of bush-covered veldt. The Crocodile River (a 

 tributary of the Komati) and the Olifants River flow 

 from west to east across this belt, at a distance of about 

 100 miles from one another. These, with the mountains, 

 enclose a roughly quadrangular area, some 7000 square 

 miles in e.xtent, which is the favourite hunting-ground of 

 Mr. F. V. Kirby. Small though this area is, it includes 

 very varied types of country. To the west are the densely 

 wooded eastern slopes of the Drakensberg, and part of 

 the turf-clad plateaus or terraces beyond ; to the east 

 lies low country with sub-tropical vegetation, intervening 

 between the Libombo Mountains and the Limpopo River. 



Fig. I.— a Head of the Gre.-it Kudu. 



Most of the area consists of barren, scrub-covered plains 

 known in this part of Africa as Bush-veldt, and near the 

 equator as the Nyika. Most of this area was once rich 

 in game. In the Bush-veldt lived the rhinoceros and 

 buffalo, the sable and roan antelopes, the gnu, waterbuck, 

 zebra and mpalla. The wooded foothills of the Drakens- 

 berg, or the " Kloof Country," was the home of the 

 koodoo, the hill-leopard, the bush-buck, and the reed- 

 buck. On the western plateau, or the " Krantz Country," 

 in addition to some of the animals mentioned, lived the 

 oribi and the mountain reed-buck. 



This book relates the experience of nearly twenty 

 years of hunting in this rich game country. The author 

 tells his story in much better English than we are used 

 to in books of sporting adventure. He is obviously not 

 only a skilled sportsman, but a man with a keen eye for 

 fine scenery, of literary tastes, and a careful and patient 



NO. 1377. VOL. 53] 



