522 Itevieivs — Dubois's Climates of the Past. 



originally stated ; and on the east, in the neighbourhood of Shoreham, 

 Strood, Frindsbury, and Loughton. Hence the re-issue of this 

 useful work, with its woodcuts (without the original plate), and with 

 additions by the author. Professor Prestwich, D.C.L., F.R.S., etc. 



VIII. — The Climates of the Geological Past and theik Eelation 

 TO the Evolution of the Sun. By EuG. Dubois. 8vo, pp. 167. 

 (London: Swan Sonnenschein aiid Co., 1895. Price 3s. 6d.) 

 ri^^HIS interesting and suggestive little volume is worth reading, 

 JL even though geologists may not be prepared to accept the 

 author's conclusions. Leaving out of account subsidiary questions, 

 his argument is mainly this : — Starting with the accepted hypothesis 

 of a cooling sun, he suggests, from a comparison of the relative 

 number of fixed stars in each class, that there is probably a rapid 

 transition from the " white " or hottest to the " yellow " or second 

 stage, and a more gradual transition to the " red " or coolest stage. 

 He then alludes to the evidence of long-continued genial conditions 

 in the earth's climate, extending apparently with little change from 

 Carboniferous to Cretaceous times. This genial and almost change- 

 less period he correlates with the " white " stage of the sun's history 

 — when the sun was comparable to Sirius or Eegulus in the light 

 and heat he gave out. Then, arguing from the scarcity of transition 

 stars between the white and yellow class, he thinks that there came 

 a rapid change to the yellow, or Capella, stage, and a great fall in 

 the heat radiated by the sun ; this period of rapid refrigeration 

 being represented by the Tertiary period, with its fast diminishing 

 temperature. At the beginning of Pleistocene times the yellow stage 

 was reached, and a series of Grlacial and inter-Glacial epochs set in, 

 corresponding with oscillations of the sun between the " yellow " 

 and the " red " or coolest stage. It is for the astronomer and 

 physicist to criticize these speculations ; but to the mere geologist 

 it seems as if the author were hurrying things on rather too fast, if 

 we must accept so vast a change in the condition of the sun as 

 having occurred during the small 2:)ortion of geological time that 

 extends from the commencement of the Tertiary period to the 

 present day. 



For a second edition it would be well to have the proofs examined 

 by an Englishman. The translation is usually well done ; but one 

 occasionally comes across German or Dutch idioms which, not having 

 the original by us, are not easy to comprehend. Among the plants 

 mentioned we find "Cornelian" (for Cornel) and "wolfs' claws" 

 (given as a living plant allied to Lepidodendron). 



IX. — Fauna Fosil de la Sierra de Catorce, San Luis Potosi, 

 por Antonio del Castillo y Jose G. Aguilera. Boletin de 

 la Comision Geologica de Mexico. No. 1. (Mexico, 1895.) 

 The Fossil Fauna of the Sierra of Catorce, in San Luis 

 Potosi, Mexico. 4to, pp. ix and 55, pis. i-xxiv. 



THE Sierra of Catorce is a comparatively isolated ridge, about 

 10 leagues in length and 2 in breadth, with a plateau-like 



