540 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XL VI. No. 1196 



present flora of N'ew Zealand can not legiti- 

 mately be postulated as having entered that 

 region as a unit at the central point advocated 

 by Willis, nor can the flora of any region as 

 a whole be dated from one period of time or 

 from a single geographical point. 



Finally the statement that the dying out of 

 species is a rare event is overwhelmingly op- 

 posed by all of the facts of paleontology and by 

 all of the facts of history unless its adherents 

 are prepared to accept the Mosaic cosmogony. 

 This comment is as true of vertebrate and 

 invertebrate paleontology as it is of plants. 

 In the case of the last the probability is very 

 great that the present flora of the globe repre- 

 sents a minute fraction of the extinct floras. 

 Pointing in the same direction is the well- 

 authenticated fact that in all the orders of 

 plants that are prevailingly arborescent the 

 geologic distribution where it is known is 

 found to have been more extensive than the 

 present distribution. The same statement is 

 true of the higher animals and of such inver- 

 tebrate groups as I am familiar with. 



So-called monotypic genera, whether plant 

 or animal, at least in the majority of cases, are 

 relicts of a once wider distribution. Among 

 plants this is strikingly true of arborescent 

 forms and needs qualification only in the case 

 of certain mainly herbaceous, relatively mod- 

 ern and prevailingly temperate groups such as 

 the Papilionacese, Labiatese, Scrophulariaceas, 

 PlantaginaeesB, Valerianacese, etc. 



Edward W. Berry 



The Johns Hopkins University 



SCIENTIFIC BOOKS 



A Text-iook of Sanitary and Applied Chem- 

 istry; or, the Chemistry of Water, Air and 

 Food. By E. H. S. Bailey, Ph.D., Pro- 

 fessor of Chemistry, University of Kansas. 

 Fourth Edition revised. New York, The 

 Macmillan Company. 1917. Cloth. 12mo, 

 xxiv-f 394 pp. Price $1.60. 

 As Dr. Bailey says in his preface, the object 

 of the book is to furnish a text, for the use of 

 students, upon chemistry as applied to the 

 most important topics having to do with daily 

 life in the household. The opening chapters 



deal with the Atmosphere, Fuels, Heating and 

 Ventilation, Lighting, "Water, Sewage, Tex- 

 tiles, Soap, Disinfectants and Poisons. The 

 second half of the book treats of the chemistry 

 of food. The treatment is naturally descrip- 

 tive only and does not cover analytical proc- 

 esses. Throughout the text there are distrib- 

 uted 197 well selected experiments which will 

 greatly help to fix important facts in the stu- 

 dent's mind. 



W. P. Mason 



SPECIAL ARTICLES 



THE UFFINGTON SHALE OF WEST VIRGINIA 

 AND ITS SUPPOSED MARINE FAUNAi 



At a number of localities in northern West 

 Virginia the Uffington shale of I. 0. White" 

 lies at the base of the Conemaugh formation, 

 occupying the interval between the Mahoning 

 sandstone above and the Upper Freeport coal 

 of the Allegheny formation below. It is a 

 dark shale, a portion or the whole of which is 

 sandy and bears plant fossils in abundance. 

 It is variable in thickness, forty feet being 

 about the maximum reported, while over 

 much of the area it is lacking altogether, the 

 sandstone being in contact with the coal. 

 The replacement of the shale by the sandstone 

 is clearly the result of erosion as is indicated 

 by the sinuous contact between the two 

 strata, the shale often varying in thickness as 

 much as twenty feet in a distance of a hun- 

 dred yards. 



In 1871, John J. Stevenson, in a paper en- 

 titled : " A geological examination of Monon- 

 galia county, West Virginia," by John J. 

 Stevenson; together with lists of fossils and 

 descriptions of new species, by F. B. Meek," " 

 described a " dark colored, fine grained, argil- 

 laceous " shale overlying the " Upper Free- 

 port " coal and containing abundant inverte- 

 brate fossils. Its thickness is given as 12 

 feet. It is said to be best exposed in the 

 " bluff bordering the bottoms two or three 



1 Published by permission of I. C. White, state 

 geologist of West Virginia. 



la I. C. White, West Virginia Geol. Survey, Vol. 

 II., 1903, p. 323. 



2 West Virginia University, Board of Begents, 

 Third Ann. Eept., 1871, for 1870, pp. 41 to 73. 



