NATURE 

strata to a depth of more than 4ooo ft., prior to their 
occupation by the post-Pliocene glaciers (p. 17). 
These figures serve to illustrate the removal of Flysch 
beds and other Cainozoic strata during Pliocene times 
from the surface of our European Alps. 
B. S. Butler, in Professional Paper 80, reports on 
the copper and other ores of the San Francisco district 
in Utah. The mines lie in the arid Great Basin, near 
the south end of the lost Lake Bonneville. The 
block-structure of the country is rendered all the more 
interesting by the continuation of the faulting into 
recent times. The intrusion of quartz-monzonite in a 
Cainozoic epoch (p. 70) has produced diopside as a 
common contact-product in the early Palaeozoic lime- 
stones, and an example (pl. xii., Fig. A), where this 
has become altered into serpentine is of interest for 
comparison with various ‘‘eozoonal"’ rocks. 
“The San Franciscan Volcanic Field, Arizona,” 
described by H. H. Robinson (Professional Paper 76), 
lies three hundred miles farther to the south, beyond 
the Grand Canyon country, but sufficiently near to 
allow of a confusion of the mountain names. San Fran- 
cisco Peak, rising 12,611 ft. above the sea, retains its 
general form as a great volcano with secondary cones, 

Fic. 
and fine igneous studies can be made in the ravines 
upon its flanks. It is believed (p. 52) to have origin- 
ally risen 8800 ft. above the plateau of horizontal 
Carboniferous rocks, and to have lost 3000 ft. by 
denudation. This region stood close to sea-level in 
late Pliocene times, and then became deluged by flows 
of basalt; elevation by faulting followed, and rhyo- 
lites and andesites appeared on the surface as it under- 
went dissection. The great volcanoes belong to this 
epoch, at the opening of the Quaternary era. A far 
greater elevation, amounting to thousands of feet, 
then tool place, introducing “the present or canyon 
cycle of erosion” (p. 93), and scattered vents emitted 
basalt and built up lava and scoria cones (see Fig. 2). 
The railway across the Colorado Plateau, from which 
a branch runs north to the Grand Canyon, gives 
access to this volcanic field. The great cone of Bill 
Williams Mountain, named after a scout killed in 
Indian warfare, is already ascended by a_tourist- 
track, and in time we may hope that Flagstaff Station 
will be as famous among geologists as Mont Dore. 
Visitors will pass on, however, to the canyon country, 
and L. F. Noble (Bulletin 549) revives our memories 
NO. 2370, VOL. 95] 


2.—Recent cone formed of ash with lava above, north-east edge of the San Francisco volcanic field. 
(APRIL. “1, TORS 
of Dutton’s survey in the fine illustrations to his work 
on “The Shinumo Quadrangle.” In the region 
treated there is only one permanent habitation. 
Plate xviii. shows the geological history of the 
country, concerning which much has been learnt since 
Dutton’s work, as recorded in a natural section rising 
a mile above the river. A hill of inclined Algonkian’ 
quartzite is seen half-way up, buried by horizontal 
strata from Cambrian to Upper Carboniferous. H. H. 
Robinson, the author of the paper on the San Fran- 
ciscan volcanic field, is cited (p. 91) as providing the 
most recent summary of the physical history of the 
canyon country. 
Alaska, which is being explored so conscientiously, 
is represented by nine bulletins published in 1913 and 
1914. While these are mostly concerned with mining 
prospects, glacialists will appreciate the evidence of 
the forward movement of ice across forests in Bulletin 
526, and of the formation of “push moraines” 25 ft. 
high, where a glacier-nose impinges upon beach- 
deposits. Though boulder-clays are rarely specifically 
mentioned, it is clear that a large part of the Alaskan 
‘“moraine ’’ material is of this character. In Bulletin 
534, for instance (p. 43), on the Yentna district, we 
read that ‘‘ deposits of glacial till ‘of 
the ground moraine type are wide- 
spread,’ up to 75 ft. in thickness, 
with particularly abundant striated 
pebbles and boulders. 
Among publications dealing with 
minerals, we may note the illus- 
trated descriptions of Ferberite, or 
wolfram free from manganese, by 
F. L. Hess and W. T. Schaller, in 
Bulletin 583. The latter author in- 
vestigates the crystallography of the 
species. Alunite attracts attention 
in Bulletin 540 (‘‘ Contributions to 
Economic Geology, 1912,” published 
in 1914, p- 347). Numerous saline 
deposits have been prospected with- 
out results for potash salts on a 
commercial scale (p. 406). The 
phosphatic shales at the top of the 
Carboniferous beds in Idaho, and 
probably of Permian age, are de- 
scribed in Bulletin 577. No. 585 
consists of a list, with localities, of 
all the useful minerals and rocks of 
the United States, arranged under 
the States in which they occur. H. S. Gale refers the 
calcium borate, Colemanite, of southern California to 
the emission of boric acid from basaltic lavas into 
travertine deposits of Miocene age (Professional Paper 
85-A, p. 8). GAL ILG: 
THE POSITION OF THE ORGANIC 
CHEMICAL INDUSTRY 
HE value of the colouring matters consumed in 
the United Kingdom is 2,000,000l. per annum, 
and these dyes are essential to textile industries, 
representing at least 200,000,000l. a year, and employ- 
ing 1,500,000 workers, and to many other industries, 
such as the wall-paper, printing, and paint industries, 
requiring lakes and pigments. In recent years 
Germany has supplied this country with nearly all 
these dyes, with organic chemicals required for photo- 
graphic purposes, with the natural and artificial pro- 
ducts used in the manufacture of scents and perfumes, 
with synthetic and other drugs and disinfectants, and 
1 Abstract of the presidential address delivered before the Chemical Society 
on March 25 by Prof. W. H. Perkin, F.R.S. 
