1879. | Proceedings of Scientific Societies. 473 
PROCEEDINGS OF SCIENTIFIC SOCIETIES. 
New York AcapEmy OF ScIENCES.—Geological Section, April 
21st, 1879.—Prof. Arnold Guyot, of Princeton College, presented 
a paper upon “The Topography of the Catskills,” embodying 
some of the leading points brought out during several years’ 
summer study of these mountains, and now nearly ready for pub- 
lication. It seems extraordinary that a region like this, in the 
oldest part of the country as regards settlement, and long cele- 
brated as a resort for travelers, hunters, artists, etc., should have 
remained so largely an unknown wilderness even to this very 
day. It was reserved for Prof. Guyot, within a few summers past, 
actually to discover and name an extensive group of mountains, 
rising into peaks in some cases over 4000 feet high. This group 
—the “Southern Catskills,” or “ Shandakens,” was not laid down 
on any map or described in any gazetteer; and when Prof. Guyot 
first looked out upon it from a southern height of the main Cat- 
skills, he had the surprising experience of a new discovery in the 
heart of the State of New York. The gazetteers had mentioned 
it as a hilly country, merely; and the fact that it contains moun- 
tains higher than the true Catskills, was new to geographical sci- 
e he scantiness of our knowledge regarding all this region 
--save in the immediate vicinity of the summer resorts—is due 
largely to the dense forest with which the slopes and summits are 
clothed, which renders it very difficult to gain connected and 
extensive views. : 
Prof. Guyot divides the whole group into two, as already inti- 
mated, the true Catskills and the Shandakens or Southern Cats- 
kills, separated by the valley of Esopus Creek. From the former 
ow the Catskill creek into the Hudson, Schoharie Creek into 
the Mohawk, and numerous affluents of the Upper De aware ; 
from the latter flow Esopus Creek and Rondout River, into the 
Hudson, and Neversink River into the Delaware. The moun- 
Top, on the northernmost range of the true Catskills, Hunter - 
mountain, on the southern range, and Slide mountain, in the 
Shandakens, all of which are over 4000 feet high.  - 
PROCEEDINGS oF THE ACADEMY oF NATURAL SCIENCES OF 
Puttaperputa, Feb. 2 5.—The President, Dr. Ruschenberger, 
in the Chair. Dr. Goldsmith exhibited some specimens of 
