Geology and, Mineralogy. 71 



3. Archcean areas of Northern New Jersey and Southeastern 

 New York; by N. L. Britton. — Prof. Britton, in his paper 

 read before the A. A. A. S. in August, 1887, divides the Archaean 

 of the New Jersey Highlands and Putnam County, New York, 

 into (1) the massive group, including quartz-syenyte, granulite, 

 and granite with little or no bedding ; (2) the iron-bearing group ; 

 (3) the gneissic and schistose group. Another series of schists 

 and limestone, including the crystalline schists of Westchester 

 County, described, as Mr. Britton observes, by Professor J. D. 

 Dana [so far as they are conformable to the limestone or dolomite 

 of the region] as [probably] of Lower Silurian age, are stated to 

 be for the greater part " unquestionably Upper Archaean." We 

 look with great interest for the evidence for this very positive 

 conclusion ; others have held the opinion, but the evidence has 

 never been published. The allusion to Prof. Dana's opposing 

 evidence on the next page, shows that he has been misread. 



J. D. D. 



4. Annual Report of the State Geologist of New Jersey for 

 the year 1887. — This report announces the near completion of the 

 topographical survey of the State — a most important work, in 

 which New Jersey is ahead of the other States, Massachusetts 

 alone excepted. 



5. On an Archcean Plant. — Graphite occurring in an Archaean 

 limestone in many very thin parallel stripes one or more inches 

 long and one to two lines wide has been described by Mr. N. L. 

 Britton as the remains of an Archaean plant, which he has 

 named Archceophyton Newberry anurn. It is a natural query 

 whether a carbonaceous limestone under pressure and in course of 

 metamorphism might not become striped like the specimen. 



6. On the Organization, of the Fossil Plants of the Coal 

 Measures. — Part XIV. The true fructification of the Ccdamites ; 

 by W. C. Williamson. — In this short memoir Prof. Williamson 

 gives his reasons for still believing that the strobile described by 

 him in 1869 from the Upper-foot coal in Strinesdale, near Saddle- 

 worth, Lancashire, not only was, as he then stated, the fruit of a true 

 Calamites, but that it was the only one that had thus far been 

 discovered. After waiting seventeen years additional specimens 

 having the same structure at last came to light. These led 

 him to reinvestigate the whole subject and to figure anew all the 

 specimens in his cabinet. The chief reason for believing in the 

 true Calamitean character of these specimens is that the pedun- 

 cle of the strobilus presents in every case substantially the same 

 essential characters as the stems of Calamites, the structure of 

 which is very different from that of any of the other Carbon- 

 iferous plants that have been made known. Although somewhat 

 modified to adapt itself for the growth of the large sporangia of 

 the higher portions of the spike, these peduncles still clearly 

 exhibit the intemodal cauals and characteristic medullary cavity 

 of Calamites, characters so distinctive as to make it extremely 

 doubtful that they could have belonged to any other plant. The 



