1032 



SCIENCE. 



LN. S. Vol. XVI. No. 417. 



It is just possible that in the Canadian areas 

 that have been referred to the Belly Eiver 

 beds two or more distinct horizons have been 

 confused under one name. In fact the late 

 Dr. George M. Dawson admits this possibility 

 in one of his early descriptions* of the Belly 

 Eiver beds, stating that in certain areas the 

 beds assigned to the Belly Eiver might be 

 supposed to overlie the Pierre shales rather 

 than underlie them. His descriptions and 

 the invertebrate fossils that he reports arouse 

 the suspicion that at some localities the forma- 

 tion includes the Fox Hills and the Judith 

 Eiver beds. 



Whether the subsequent work of the Can- 

 adian geologists has removed all grounds for 

 doubt as to the stratigraphy in all the Belly 

 Eiver areas and whether these doubts could 

 reasonably involve any of the localities at 

 which vertebrate remains were obtained I 

 have not been able to learn from the published 

 reports. These queries are worthy of the at- 

 tention of those familiar with the field. 



The point which I wish to emphasize is the 



truth of Professor Osborn's statement that 



' the true Judith Eiver beds certainly overlie 



the Port Pierre and are of more recent age.' 



T. "W. Stanton. 



Washington, D. C, 

 November 25, 1902. 



THE PRICKLES OF XANTHOXYLUM. 



In No. 413 of Science, p. 871, there ap- 

 peared a note calling attention to an error 

 which occurs in some books, regarding the 

 nature of the prickles of Xanthoxylum. As 

 in that note also the ' Cyclopedia of American 

 Horticulture ' is cited as making the errone- 

 ous statement that the paired prickles at the 

 base of the petioles are stipular spines, I 

 should like to point out that this statement 

 is made only in the illustration, while in the 

 text these bodies are always called prickles, 

 though no particular mention is made of the 

 occasional occurrence of paired prickles at 

 the base of the petioles, and none of the ab- 

 sence of stipules in the genus, since this is 

 a character common to the whole family of 



* Geol. Surv. Canada, ' Eept. of Progress for 

 1882-83-84,' pp. 118-126 C. 



Eutaceae. The discrepancy of text and illus- 

 tration is exi^lained by the fact that the illus- 

 tration was inserted without my knowledge 

 after I had sent in my manuscript and that 

 I had no opportunity to read proofs of my 

 articles in the fourth volume of that work, 

 since I was abroad in Europe during the time 

 it was printed. If I had considered the 

 prickles in Xanthoxylum metamorphosed 

 stipules, I certainly should have spoken of 

 them as spines and not as prickles. There 

 occurs a similar arrangement of prickles in 

 some species of roses, chiefly in species of the 

 sections CinnamomeaB and Carolinse, but in 

 this case no doubt can arise of their nature, 

 since the true stipules are conspicuously pres- 

 ent, usually adnate to the petioles. In both 

 genera these prickly bodies are simply out- 

 growths of the epidermis and, therefore, mor- 

 phologically to be considered prickles, though 

 they might, in regard to their ecological sig- 

 nificance, possibly be considered equivalent to 

 stipular spines. Alfred Eehder. 



Arnold Arboretum. 



natural history in england. 



In a letter to the editor of Science, De- 

 cember 5, 1902, Professor Packard writes as 

 follows : 



" Our American children are * * * woe- 

 fully lacking in interest in natural history 

 * * * far behind German, and even English 

 children, I fancy." 



The ' even ' in this sentence staggered me 

 so completely that I am moved to write in 

 protest — or at least in inquiry. I received 

 my school education — the regular English 

 classical course — in Susses and Worcester- 

 shire, and spent various holidays in Devon- 

 shire. I thus had groups of boy friends and 

 acquaintances in three English counties. So 

 far as I remember, it was a matter of course 

 that we should be interested in some branch 

 of natural history. At any rate, I can now 

 recall but two exceptions to this rule from the 

 whole list of my schooltime friends. And I 

 well remember that our natural history in- 

 terests proved a bond of friendship with far- 

 mers' boys and gamekeepers' sons, with whom 

 we should otherwise, as public-school boys, 

 have been at daggers drawn. 



