800 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. III. No. 74. 



of impressing the facts concerning the 

 earth's surface. It may be questioned 

 whether the ' mean elevation of areas be- 

 tween successive contour lines ' is a worthy- 

 object of geographical as contrasted with 

 arithmetical study. It only produces con- 

 fusion to tabulate under one heading a 

 steep and a flat slope of the same limiting 

 altitudes ; but it is quite otherwise with 

 the summation of steep and of flat areas, 

 under appropriate but not arbitrary limits 

 of height. A remark under this heading 

 also might be generally applied to the 

 whole project : "It would be very suitable 

 as an exercise and training for students, if 

 any institution existed in this country 

 where students would be induced to study 

 geography seriously." The geographical 

 description " would be the most important 

 part of the memoir, and must be the work of 

 a trained geographer. * * * It would deal di- 

 rectly with the relation of the people to the 

 land, showing the control exerted by geo- 

 graphical conditions on the sites of towns, 

 on dwellings, occupations, the distribution 

 of the people, the lines of communication." 

 Let us hope that Dr. Mill's excellent pro- 

 ject need not wait until that distant time 

 when trained geographers are found, ready 

 made; but that the Royal Geographical Soci- 

 ety will at once announce that it is ready to 

 publish chapters of these memoirs, by whom- 

 soever prepared, but accordant with a sys- 

 tematic and comprehensive plan, and ap- 

 proved by a committee of editors. Almost 

 any one of the chapters might be chosen as 

 the subject for a candidate's thesis for his 

 doctorate, and this kind of encouragement of 

 serious geographical study might well serve 

 as the thin end of the wedge that shall farther 

 open up the proper development of geo- 

 graphy in the English universities. 



logical atlas, are lately added to the grow- 

 ing list of surveyed areas. The limestone 

 country of Florida is revealed as showing 

 typical ' Kard ' forms, without continuous 

 valleys, but discharging its surface waters 

 by underground channels, entered through 

 sinkholes. Although a faint relief, it rivals 

 in perfection of this kind of form the more 

 famous Karst district of Carniola. King- 

 fisher sheet, Oklahoma, exhibits a peculiar 

 relation between Cimarron river, on the 

 north, and the North fork of Canadian river, 

 lying twenty miles further south and 300 

 feet higher; the branches of the former 

 river heading within two or three miles of 

 the latter and bidding fair to capture and 

 divert it at various points. The down- 

 stream deflection of tributary streams is 

 well illustrated in the case of Bird creek^ 

 which, when less than half a mile from the 

 Cimarron, turns and flows six miles south- 

 east along the margin of the flood plain be- 

 fore entering the main river, and indeed 

 then enters it only because the river crosses 

 to the southern side of its flood plain and 

 picks the tributary up ; thus repeating on a 

 small scale the much larger example of the 

 Yazoo and the Mississippi. The Oneida 

 and Oriskany sheets, N. Y., might be com- 

 mended to the author of the statement that 

 " three distinct mountain masses enter IS'ew 

 York from the south and extend across it 

 in a general northeast direction." These 

 sheets show in part the definite northern 

 termination of the Alleghany plateau south 

 of the Mohawk valley, in bluffs that as- 

 cend six or seven hundred feet. The second 

 sheet includes the greater part of the ' long 

 level ' in the Mohawk valley, below Rome ; of 

 particular interest as the outlet of the expan- 

 ded Lake Ontario in late glacial times. Many 

 other sheets equally deserve comment. 



RECENT SHEETS OF OUR NATIONAL MAP. 



Thirty odd sheets of the topographical 

 map, in preparation for our national geo- 



A short historv of the great lakes. 



Under the above title, F. B. Taylor is 

 contributins; several articles to the Inland 



