134 Reviews—A. Daubrée’s Experimental Geology. 
Mr. Blanford places the high-level laterite in the Hocene series, 
and considers it of detrital origin; this may be the case with the 
beds in the northern parts of the great trap area, but along the 
southern parts all the evidence obtainable is strongly opposed to the 
idea of a detrital origin, and in favour of its being purely a product 
of decomposition of highly ferruginous trap flows. Till therefore the 
Survey of the central part of the trap area shall have been completed, 
it must remain doubtful whether the ferruginous rocks capping the 
uppermost trap flows at both ends of the area are really referable 
to one and the same formation. 
The relations of the several members of the Eocene and newer 
Tertiary rocks of Sind, the Salt Range, the North-west Punjab, the 
Sub-Himalayan tracts, Assam and Burma, are fully discussed, and 
many points of great interest are well brought out; more especially 
the correlation of the Pliocene Siwalik fauna with the faunas of the 
equivalent rocks in Sind, Perim Island, the Narbada, and Trawadi 
valleys in the East, and the fauna of Pikermi in the West. 
Of extreme interest are the speculations as to the distribution of 
the dry lands existing during these periods, and the effect upon the 
successive faunas and floras of India, of the connexions with Africa 
and the Malay Islands, also the inquiry into the series of upheavals 
which raised the Himalayas to their present vast height. Most of 
this upraising is shown to have taken place in Post-Plioocene times, 
and there are evidences that the volcanic forces are not yet extinct 
below the vast mountain chain. 
By no means all the points of interest treated of in the Manual 
are even alluded to in the present notice; but as the limits proposed 
have already been far exceeded, we must now take leave of this great 
contribution to geological science, with hearty good wishes that it 
may be appreciated by the public as richly as it deserves to be. 
Every geologist will find it a work worth possessing, and many can 
afford to purchase it, its price (16s.) being absurdly low, and a mar- 
vellous contrast to the exorbitant charges which H.M. Stationery 
Office forces on the Geological Survey of Great Britain for its 
smallest publications. R. BLS 
J].—Erupus Synrpfitiqurs pz Gtotocim ExpirientaLe. Par 
A. Davsprir. Premrire Partre. Deuxiéme Section. Phe- 
nomeénes Mécaniques. (Paris, 1879.) 
HE first section of this work, which deals with chemical 
phenomena, has already been reviewed in the pages of this 
Maeazinz, Vol. VI. p. 421 (September, 1879). In this second 
section the writer deals with the mechanical actions which have been 
developed during the earth’s history, and applies the experimental 
method to their investigation. Though our means are even more 
disproportionate to the effects to be imitated in the case of mechanical 
than with chemical forces, still much light is thrown on various 
departments of Geological Science. 
The first chapter is devoted to elucidating the formation of gravel, 
sand, and mud. Fragments of rock were rotated together with 
