Reviews and Notices of Boohs. 



137 



carried on with the aid of the unrivalled herbarium of Sir 

 William Hooker, and with the assistance of Dr Mueller, the zealous 

 and able director of the Botanic Garden at Melbourne, who has 

 already done much to illustrate the Australian flora in his "Frag- 

 menta Phytographise Australise," and other publications. This 

 important flora could not be placed in better hands, and the com- 

 pletion of it will be hailed as a boon to science in general, and 

 more especially to those who are prosecuting botany in the great 

 continent of Australia. 



Air-Breathers of the Coal Period : a Descriptive Account of 

 the Remains of Land Animals found in the Coal Forma- 

 tion of Nova Scotia.^ with Remarks on their 'bearing on 

 Theories of the Formation of Coal and of the Origin of 

 Species. By J. W. Dawson, LL.D., F.E.S, F.G.S., 

 Principal of M'Gill University. 8vo. Pp. 81. Mon- 

 treal : Dawson Brothers, 1863. 



In the carboniferous period, the author remarks, though land 

 plants abound, air-breathers are few, and most of these have 

 only been recently recognised. We know, however, with cer- 

 tainty, that the dark and luxuriant forests of the coal period 

 were not destitute of animal life. Keptiles crept under their 

 shade, land-snails and millipedes fed on the rank leaves and 

 decaying vegetable matter, and insects flitted through the air of 

 the sunnier spots. Great interest attaches to these creatures — 

 perhaps the first-born species in some of their respective types, 

 and certainly belonging to one of the oldest land faunas, and pre- 

 senting prototypes of future forms equally interesting to the 

 geologist and the zoologist. 



The author, who is well known as a sound and able geologist, 

 after describing various species of Hylonomus, Baphetes, Den- 

 drerpeton, Hylerpeton, Eosaurus, Xylobius, Pupa, which occur 

 in the Nova Scotia carboniferous strata, concludes with some 

 valuable remarks on the nature of the animals and on the state of 

 the globe at the time when they lived on it. He states, " In the 

 coal measures of Nova Scotia, while marine conditions are absent, 

 there are ample evidences of fresh- water or brackish- water con- 

 ditions, and of land surfaces, suitable for the air-breathing animals 

 of the period. Nor do I believe that the coal measures of Nova 

 Scotia were exceptional in this respect. It is true that in Great 

 Britain, evidences of marine life do occur in the coal measures, 

 but not, so far as I am aware, in circumstances which justify the 

 inference that the coal is of marine origin. Alternations of 



NEW SERIES. — -VOL. XIX. NO. I. JANUARY 1864. S 



