180 Scientific Intelligence. 



explanations of the origin of the remarkable structures popularly- 

 called "fossil palmetto stumps" are given. These have been 

 variously interpreted by different writers. In this article they 

 are explained as due, at least in most cases, to the solvent action 

 of carbonated rain-water, localized at first in depressions of the 

 surface rock by any one of several causes, but continued down- 

 ward by the formation of a central core of clay, etc., around 

 which the water can percolate and evaporate. They are com- 

 pared to the tubular "sand-pipes" of the English white chalk, 

 described by Lyell and others. 



In the chapter on the paleontology all the land-shells hitherto 

 found fossil are described and figured, and a list is given of the 

 marine fossils of the Devonshire formation, with some figures. 

 Of the latter about ten species are not certainly known to be now 

 living in Bermuda waters, but they are all West Indian. The 

 Walsingham formation contains 17 species and 6 named vari- 

 eties of land shells, of which 9 species and 4 varieties are extinct. 

 This paper contains a Bibliography and a copious index. 



2. The Bermuda Islands. Part V, Section I ; by A. E. 

 Verrill. 147 pp., 28 plates, 1 map, and 120 cuts in the text. 

 Trans. Conn. Acad. Science, vol. xii, 1907. — This part is devoted 

 entirely to descriptions of the characteristic life of the coral 

 reefs, particularly the corals, actinias, gorgonians, hydroids, echi- 

 noderms, and siliceous sponges. The remaining groups are to be 

 treated in a subsequent section. Nearly all the species are well 

 illustrated by photographic half-tones, or by drawings. A num- 

 ber of new species and a new genus of sponges are described, and 

 two new gorgonians, one representing a new genus. Figures of 

 the spicules of all the gorgonians and sponges are given. Man}^ 

 of the figures of the corals, gorgonians, and actinias are from pho- 

 tographs of the living animals, by A. H. Verrill. Those ot the 

 gorgonise are remarkably good. Nothing like them has been pub- 

 lished hitherto. Bibliographies of each group are given, and the 

 index is very complete. This work is admirably adapted for the 

 uses of students of tropical marine life, not only at Bermuda, but 

 in the West Indies and Florida also, for the species are nearly all 

 found in the West Indies. 



3. Maryland Geological Survey, Calvert County; by George 

 Burbank Shattuck, Benjamin L. Miller and others. Pp. 227, 

 pis. xiv, figs. 11. Baltimore, Jan., 1907 (The Johns Hopkins 

 Press). — This volume is the fourth of a series of reports on the 

 county resources, and is accompanied by topographic, geologic 

 and agricultural soil maps on a scale of approximately a mile to 

 an inch. Calvert County constitutes a peninsula on the west side 

 of Chesapeake Bay, bounded on its own western side by the 

 Patuxent River. Its surface is an undulating plain with an extreme 

 elevation of 1 80 feet near the northern limits. The geological 

 formations are Miocene and Pleistocene with some Eocene. 



J. B. 



