472 



SCIENCE. 



[N. rt. Vol. XVU No. 4-^9. 



tion as to the Laramie or Upper Cretaceous 

 age of the typical Judith River Beds.' 



4. Since Hayden's stratigraphical observa- 

 tions near the mouth of Little Rocky Moun- 

 tain Creek do not harmonize with the paleon- 

 tological correlations of Drs. Wliite and Stan- 

 ton at the mouth of the Judith River, and 

 since no one has ever revisited the first lo- 

 cality and reversed Hayden's determinations 

 by a reexamination of the stratigraphy, I be- 

 lieve the exact stratigraphic position of the 

 Judith Ri"ver beds remains unsettled and that 

 it is premature to assert that ' the true Judith 

 River beds certainly overlie the Ft. Pierre 

 and are of more recent age,' although this is 

 now very generally believed and may event- 

 ually prove to be the case. 



J. B. Hatcher. 



BOTANICAL NOTES. 



VEGETABLE GALLS. 



These curious growths, which result from 

 the action of two organisms, have not received 

 the attention of botanists which they deserve. 

 That they develop because of the presence of 

 some insect, or as a consequence of the sting 

 or puncture of another insect, does not make 

 them less vegetable in nature. A prickly gall 

 on a rose leaf is a rose structure as truly as 

 the rose fruit is, and its growth and develop- 

 ment are as properly the objects of study by 

 the botanist as are the growth and develop- 

 ment of any other plant structures. 



Mr. Edward Connold, an English botanist, 

 has recently brought out a most interesting 

 book on 'Vegetable Galls,' which must help 

 to direct the attention of botanists to this 

 neglected field. By means of fine half-tone 

 reproductions of photographs he shows more 

 than one hundred galls and their variations, 

 and to these he has added descriptions which 

 bring out quite methodically their structural 

 characteristics, and their relation to the causal 

 parasites. In treating the subject the author 

 groups galls into: (1) Root galls, (2) stem 

 galls, (3) leaf galls and (4) flower and fruit 

 galls. Of the first he illustrates six kinds 

 by as many plates. Among the thirty-one 

 plates of stem galls perhaps the most sug- 

 gestive are numbers 23 and 24, which show 



galls on the twigs and stems of Salix cinerea 

 caused by the larvse of Agromyza scliineri, 

 and which so closely resemble the early stages 

 of the ' diamonds ' on the ' diamond willow ' 

 of the Great Plains as to suggest similarity 

 of origin. Of leaf galls there are no less 

 than sixty-three plates, representing a great 

 number of different forms much like those 

 found on leaves iii this country. Twelve 

 plates are given to the illustration of the 

 galls on flowers and fruits, including two in 

 which the galls are the familiar ' plum 

 pockets ' due to the presence of the minute 

 fungus Exoascus insititiw. 



A similar work should be undertaken in 

 this country. Mr. Connold has set a good 

 example, showing us how to illustrate as well 

 as how to treat the subject. No doubt the 

 text is capable of improvement, and yet we 

 should not object to a work in which the text 

 was patterned directly after that found in the 

 English book. Here is an open field for some 

 of our active young botanists to enter. 



POPULARIZING THE STUDY OF FUNGI. 



Any book which increases popular interest 

 in any department of botany should be wel- 

 comed by scientific men, even though the 

 treatment may not be quite like that in works 

 designed to be used by students and professors 

 in the colleges and universities. No doubt 

 those of us who belong to the latter class are 

 quite too much inclined to measure the value 

 of every book by our own needs and stand- 

 ards. We cormnend the book which meets 

 our wants and which is so written that it 

 seems to be addressed to us or our students, 

 and too often we deem of little value the book 

 in which we find nothing new for ourselves, 

 although it may appeal directly to many 

 other people who know less about the subject. 

 That there are some popular books which are 

 simply atrocious is true, and the present 

 writer has been obliged to denounce them in 

 strong terms, and yet it is an open question 

 whether even the worst of these are wholly 

 bad. "With their crude drawings and barbaric 

 coloring, they may appeal to certain classes 

 of untrained minds much more than the ele- 



