1896 | CURRENT LITERATURE 349 
species and confined to the island of Juan Fernandez. The conifers are 
abundantly represented, and among them the new genus Nageiopsis, so 
closely resembling a cycad. Naturally, Sequoia occurs in the formation, as 
it seems to in cretaceous and tertiary deposits over nearly the whole globe. 
The dicotyledons are abundant enough, but the monocotyledons are very rare, 
to the important part played by the genus Populus in the geological history 
of plants. It is one of the most widespread genera of fossil plants, and 
seems to have developed along several distinct lines, and, “historically con- 
sidered, is the most interesting of all dicotyledonous genera.” 
r. Knowlton’s paper” is a brief preliminary statement concerning a full 
report which will appear later. It seems that the most remarkable fossil 
forest known occurs in the Yellowstone National Park, and it has yielded 
abundant material in excellent condition for study. The author contrasts the 
flora of the park today with this tertiary flora. “The dominant elements of 
the living flora are the abundant coniferous forests, but these involve a very 
meager display of species; the tertiary forests, however, were characterized 
by the dicotyledonous trees, such as walnuts, hickories, oaks, beeches, chest- 
nuts, elms, magnolias, sycamores, sumacs, lindens, azalias, persimmons, and 
ashes. There seems to be little relation between the two floras, and they are 
certainly not related by descent. The tertiary flora has its affinities at the 
south, while the present flora is evidently of northern origin.”—J. M. C. 
» Amer. Jour. Sci. IV. 2:51. 1896. 
