REVIEWS. 185 
long droughts, which often last for months during summer, 
there is a great accumulation of dust. This gives rise to another 
phenomenon, of frequent occurrence on the steppe, reminding 
one of water-spouts on the sea, but filled with dust instead of 
water. Suppose the great flat steppe stretched-out beneath the 
blue sky—nothing visible—no breath of air apparently stirring — 
the whole plain an embodiment of sultriness, silence, and calm- 
ness—when gradually rise in the distance six or eight columns of 
dust, like inverted cones, two or three hundred feet high, gliding 
and gliding along the plain in solemn company: they approach, 
they pass, and vanish again in the distance, like huge genii on 
some preternatural errand.” 
Webiews, 
The Dyeing Properties of Lichens. By W. Lauper Linpsay, 
M.D., Perth. 
This age, as the author of the tract above named well ob- 
serves, is pre-eminently distinguished as an age of discovery and 
enterprise in every department of Nature’s domains. Great 
efforts are made, and making, to discover some substitute for 
flax, or rather for discovering some pulpy matter which may be 
used instead of linen rags in the manufacture of paper. We are~ 
now writing on paper manufactured from straw, and for com- 
mon purposes we find it a very excellent article. It presents a 
uniformly hard and smooth surface, imbibes the ink readily, 
and may be written on both sides; it is also a very economical 
paper. Several British plants produce a tenacious fibrous bark, 
which we think might be available in the present scarcity of 
rags. But we have a different subject before us ; revenons & nos 
moutons, or “let us stick to our text.” We are glad to meet 
Dr. Lindsay either as a botanist or as a chemist, although in the 
last-named character he is somewhat beyond our bounds ; this 
being the case, both in justice to him and in deference to our 
readers, we think it best to leave the Doctor to speak for him- 
self. 
“Tn conclusion, or by way of résumé, 1 shall briefly sum up the chief 
grounds on which I beg to direct public and scientific attention to the 
N.S. VOL. I. 2B 
