REVIEWS. 237 
have certain limits; that a. can arise from natural selection, or 
physical changes, only when these act in given directious and for a given 
time, after the — of Bon whether in the individual or the 
group, if sudden h do not intervene, all changes must be degrada- 
tional in posit PE causes, and the struggle for existence can 
no longer improve the vitiated organization when it has assed this 
period. Its death is decreed as certainly as its line of developmental 
changes must have been before it was born, and whatever agency other 
laws may have, they can only act with more or less force and velocity in 
these usi a RAS paths of progress and decline, or cut them short by 
the destruction of the organization. — A. HYATT 
THE TORREY BOTANICAL CLUB, ee under the auspices of its Presi- 
dent and Nestor, meets at the Herbarium in Columbia College, began 
with the year to issue its ‘ ahi in monthly numbers of four pages 
each. The notices and memoranda thus issued relate chiefly to the local 
flora of New York, which is the special charge of the Club; but matters 
of more than local interest are touched pics making it well worth the 
attention of our botanists throughout the country. For example, in the 
February number, Mr. Leggett, the Wn explains the anomaly of Lepi- 
cotyledons, in line with the radicle, and in which the bend is made, are in 
the position answering to incumbent, and so the ee take the ac- 
cumbent position by a twist of ninety degrees. The *“ Bulletin” is fur- 
nished, upon application to the editor, 224 East Tenth street, New York, 
for a dollar a year, or seven copies for five dollars 
Foss, PLANTS FROM THE Wrsr.*— This report closes Dr. Hayden's 
report reviewed by us in March, 1870. By some oversight we confused it 
with a former paper of Professor Newberry, a and thus passed by some 
a general review of the geology of North America, and as these govern- 
ment reports, notwithstanding their wide distribution, generally have but 
few non-scientific readers, we shall rep ublish this for the benefit of our 
subscribers in some succeeding number 
e chapter on the ** Cretaceous Flora” gives a concise summary of the 
rious go overnment expeditions which have made collections d an 
plants of this period. The conclusions reached are identical with those 
ich we have already quoted in the review referred to above in March, 
ien page € 
Scotland. This and the large number of other identical miocene species, 
lead to the inference that North America and Europe were connected by 
O T E 
* Report on the Cretaceous and Tertiary Plants. By Professor J. 8. Newberry. 
