D£CEMBEK 28, 1883.] 



SCIENCE. 



837 



argument for a high geological position of the con- 

 glomerates (based on an assumed regulardip towards 

 the south-west in this region) by the supposition that 

 ■conglomerates must express nearness to shore, and 

 that, running along a line from shore into deep water, 

 it is safe to assume that for any given length of time 

 the thickness of the deposit will diminish with the 

 distance from the shore; and hence, if the genera' 

 relation of sliore to deep water continued ihrouslithe 

 upper Devonian, the dip of the strata will diniinisli 

 as we ascend in the series, ami tlie tendency of one 

 who depended upon a general rale of dip would be to 

 reckon the more southern deposits too high. Profes- 

 sor Williams has good evidence that this has been 

 done for the sands of Wyoming and Alleghany coun- 

 ties. 



Professor Williams's observations lead him to the 

 opinion (which may be modified by further facts), that 

 the sand-tom-s lying at tlie top of the series at Por- 

 tage Falls, barren of fossils so far as reported, are, 

 wlien taken as a mass, straligrapliically identical with 

 the lower Chemung sandstones farther south and 

 west, and tliat geographical conditions had more to 

 do with tlie presence or absence of the Chemung 

 fauna than had the geological time of the deposit, 

 after once the Chemung fauna appeared in the sea. 



The present stage of Professor Williams's investiga- 

 tions leads him to the following opinion as to tlie 

 distribution of faunas at this mid-upper Devonian 

 for the eastern area: — 



1. A Hamilton fauna coming in from the east and 

 north, and extending around the southern border of 

 the old paleozoic continent into the interior sea, 

 through Canada West, Michigan, etc., to Iowa, etc. 



2. A black slate fauna, at first reaching quite to the 

 eastern New York areas, but, with the advance of 

 time, oscillating back and forth, each stage withdraw- 

 ing farther and farther to the west and south. 



3. A sparse Portage fauna, mainly small l.imelli- 

 branclis and pteropods and cephalopods, rather pelagic 

 in cliaracter, common over the New York area, but 

 whose centre or origin he is unable to trace. 



4. A Chemung fauna from the south and east, push- 

 ing northward with the withdrawal of the Hamilton 

 fauna, mingling with it at first in eastern New York 

 areas, but in western New York not appearing at 

 all until the complete withdrawal of the Hamilton 

 fauna. 



There are also traces of a fifth fauna over this re- 

 gion; for, as the Chemung fauna is followed towards 

 the western part of the state, species characteristic 

 of the subcarboniferons of the interior begin to ap- 

 pear, both in the nature of the varietal raodilications 

 of the species and in the rare new forms mixed with 

 the Chemung species, leading to the suspicion that 

 the subcarboniferons faunas of the western interior 

 may have been contemporaneous with the Chemung 

 faunas of New York and Pennsylvania. He says, 

 however, that the solution of this problem must be 

 left until a more thorough study of the western in- 

 terior deposits and their faunas is made, and that the 

 problems involved are too complex to make hasty 

 generalizations safe. 



These investigations have been partly in the line 

 of some remarks made by Profes«or James H.iil in 

 the 'Paleontology of New York' (vol. iv. part i., 

 March, 1807, p. 2.i7), where be speaks of the diminu- ' 

 tion of Devonian types and the augmentation of car- 

 boniferous types in the same beds in western New 

 York, and also expresses the opinion that the min- 

 gling of Devonian and carbon if i-rnus aspects is due to 

 geographical and physical coinlilions, and not to dif- 

 ference ill age or chronological sequence of the beds 

 which contain the fossils. Professor Williams is 

 elaborating this idea, and is dissecting the faunas 

 and tracing them to their centres of distribution. 



NOTES AND NEWS. 



Profkssor S ylvicster, who has resigned the chair 

 of mathematics at the Johns Hopkins university, 

 and has been appointed to the Savilian professorship 

 of geometry at the University of Oxford, sailed for 

 Europe on Saturday last, Dec. 22. The night before 

 his departure from IJaltimore, a farewell assembly 

 was held at the university in his honor. Mr. Matthew 

 Arnold, who was present, made a brief speech. Kes- 

 olutions were read on behalf of the board of trustees 

 and of the teachers in the university, expressing 

 their profound regret at the departure of Professor 

 Sylvester, and the highest appreciation of his work 

 and of the great stimulus his presence has given to 

 mathematical research in this country. Professor 

 Sylvester responded in a speech of characteristic 

 warmth and nditctf, in which, along with most 

 enthusiastic admiration and approval of the univer- 

 sity he has helped to inaugurate, he took the oppor- 

 tunity of making some pointed suggestions. One of 

 these was addressed to millionnaires, to whom he 

 indicated several ways in which, while aiding the 

 Johns Hopkins university, they might secure for 

 themselves imperishable fame. Another pointed at 

 the advisal)ility of introducing a system of pensions 

 or some equivalent provision for superaniuiated and 

 disabled professors; and still another was a protest 

 against the dismemberment of a university library by 

 the establishment of specialized branches. Professor 

 Sylvester's departure removes from the university 

 not only the most distinguished scientific man, but 

 the most interesting personality connected with it; 

 and his absence will make a gap in the general life 

 of the university no less than in his own department. 

 It is hardly to our credit that no American college 

 has conferred an honorary degree upon him during 

 his residence in this country. 



— In his recent address to the Royal society. Presi- 

 dent Huxley slates that ihirly-eight of tlie Chal- 

 lenger reports have been published, forming eight 

 quarto volumes, with 4, lU.'i pages of letter-press, 

 483 lithographic plates, and other illustrations. 

 Thirty-four of these memoirs are on zoological, four 

 on physical, subjects. Nine reports are now nearly all 

 in type, and some of them partly printed. These 

 will be published within three months, and will form 

 three zoological volumes with 230 plates and many 



