556 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. V. No. 118. 



has been executed with scrupulous fidelity. 

 Some offenders will writhe at the point of his 

 pen, as they feel the keen discernment of his 

 criticisms, and others may thank their own insig- 

 nificance for the charitable mantle of his silence. 

 Meanwhile, this Introduction takes its rightful 

 place as the most valuable and most inter- 

 esting contribution ever made to the subject of 

 which it treats. 



Lacking space for any adequate analysis of 

 this portion of the Dictionary, we prefer to say 

 no more. 



Elliott Coues. 



Recent Geological Bibliographies. (Bibliography 

 and Index of North American Geology, Pale- 

 ontology, Petrology and Mineralogy for 1895; 

 F. B. Weeks ; Bui. U. S. Geol. Survey, No. 

 146, 130 pp.; Washington, 1896. Bibliography 

 of Missouri Geology; C. R. Keyes; Mo. Geol. 

 Surv., Vol. X., pp. 221-523; Jefferson City, 

 1896.) 



Perhaps there are no publications more wel- 

 come or more serviceable to the worker in any 

 branch of science than bibliographies. When 

 accurately and conveniently arranged they save 

 the specialist much time, energy and money. 

 One who is not a specialist is even more 

 dependent on them. This is particularly true 

 in our country, where so many who are inter- 

 ested in scientific subjects are necessarily lo- 

 cated where library facilities are poor. The 

 worker in some small town, miles, perhaps, 

 from any really good library, learns to carefully 

 treasure all bibliographic matter. Bibliogra- 

 phies render distant libraries more or less acces- 

 sible, and enable book purchases to be made by 

 mail with the same certainty of satisfactory 

 selection which comes from personal examina- 

 tion. A glance over the list of periodicals ex- 

 amined by Mr. Weeks shows that it is quite 

 complete. Indeed the U. S. Survey library is 

 one of the most complete geological libraries in 

 America. The acquisitions for 1895, as listed 

 here, include 575 titles. In Mr. Weeks' paper 

 there is, under each title, a brief abstract of the 

 contents of the paper noted. This in a certain 

 sense brings the library to each worker, while 

 a visit to the library would be impossible to 

 many geologists, except at great expense. 



The survey has from the first recognized the 

 responsibility which comes with the possession 

 of an excellent library, and has issued many 

 helpful bibliographies.* Two of these were 

 compiled by Mr. Weeks, and their wide use has 

 shown that they were carefully planned and 

 conscientiously executed. In the present, as in 

 the preceding papers, the references are full 

 and clear, the abstracts concise and the ar- 

 rangement convenient. Limits have necessarily 

 been drawn. The proper limits to such a work 

 are a matter of opinion. It would seem, for 

 instance, that signed editorials in standard 

 journals might properly be included, since they 

 often contain much which is germane to current 

 geologic discussion. In this they seem on a par 

 with signed reviews which have been included. 

 While certain trade journals, such as Engineer- 

 ing and Mining Journal, have been included, 

 others, which often contain original papers of 

 merit, for example the Colliery Engineer, have 

 been excluded. Since so large a portion of the 

 work of the modern geologist has to do with 

 economic subjects, an extension of the scope of 

 the work to include a larger portion of the 

 economic literature would be welcome. Cer- 

 tain of the discussions in such a book as ' The 

 Mineral Industry,'! would probably be as 

 helpful to the working geologist as some of the 

 strictly paleontologic literature noted. This is 

 a criticism, not of the bibliography itself, but 

 upon its possibly too restricted scope. 



The paper by Dr. Keyes is on a somewhat 

 different plan. The attempt has been made to 

 bring together all the literature bearing upon 

 the geology of a single State. The result is 

 that a considerable number of titles have been 

 added to the list published by Sampson. J There 

 is the same lack, however, of references to im- 

 portant economic literature that is shown by Mr. 

 Weeks' paper. Numerous papers upon the zinc 

 and lead deposits of Missouri have been pub- 

 lished in the Engineering and Mining Journal, 

 and any one studying the deposits would need 

 to be familiar with these papers, yet none have 



•See Bulletins 7, 13, 44, 63, 69, 71, 75, 91, 99, 100, 

 102, 121, 127, 130, 135. 



t Scientific Pub. Co., New York. 



tGeol. Surv. Mo., Bui. 2, 158 pp. Jefferson City, 

 1890. 



