sin and Botany. 149 
red alge. 
cretions of silica. On making a thin section of one of these con- 
lg a pair of legs of a coleopterous insect was visible in the 
= Sade ; the greater part of the concretion was made up of petrified 
alge, 
I e of the ant springs at the California geysers, having a 
Seaorainre of 198° F., he found two kinds of Conferva, one 
capillary, weviblag Hydrocroe cis Bischoffit, but larger, the other 
a filament, with globular enlargements at intervals, In another 
spring, the temperature 174° F., many Oscillarie were found, 
which by the interlacement of their Salen fibers formed a semi- 
gelatinous mass ; and also two diatoms. In the water of the creek 
y the a enence of free sulphuric acid, and Dr. Blake suggests 
that thi 18 may account for the rarity of diatoms.—Proe. Cal. Acad. 
Sei., iv, 183, 189, 193 
4, Life in the Mammoth Cave. The Mammoth Cave and its 
penis or ceeiehions of the Fishes, Insects and and 
the and a 
general ; by A. S, ek Spe In., and F. W. Purnam, Editors of 
the American a Neem 62 pp. 8vo. Salem, 1872. —This excel- 
lent and most intere sting memoir first appeared i in the American 
Naturalist for aan er, 1871, and January, 1872. It. treats of 
One of the most curious departments of natural history,—the sud- 
terranean life of the continent and world, and is illustrated by two 
Plates and many wood-cuts. The work is got up in fine style, and 
is issued wy) _ palsape gern Agency at Sal 
- Re eprod n of Sponges.—Mr. H. id Carter has an impor- 
tant article on mie subject in the Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist. for June, 
‘nd also in the same number he describes two new sponges 
~ Antarctic Sea, and a new species of Tethya from Shet and. 
egy Brown's first Botanical Paper, “ The Botanical 
ae wo " Angus,” which was read before the Edinburgh Nat- 
: S. records last summer by Dr. Carru athers, 
gine in oe J ournal of Botany, British and esi for 
. A rarer plants 
- i i. e seaclt common in Scotland, but this is far fro 
y the sti It has of late been. asserted that the Eee os 
