SCIENTIFIC SUMMARY. 517 
that must have (if at all) then existed. — Vide pamphlet published by Long- 
man & Co., 1865. 
Buskin on the Alps. — A series of papers upon the subject of the conforma- 
tion of the Alps has appeared in the Geological Magazine. Mr. Euskin’s 
style, even when applied to his own subject, is frequently unintelligible, the 
writer appearing, in his effort to be thought original, to exhibit a contempt 
for everything approaching to clearness and common sense. W e may remark 
that his essays on the Alps, though a little more comprehensible than his 
“ Cestus Papers,” in the Art Journal, are at times difficult to understand. 
However, we commend them to our readers’ notice, as, though hardly scien- 
tific, they are certainly curious. 
The Laurentian {?) Bocks of Connemara. — In the Geological Magazine for 
March last. Sir E. Murchison stated, among other things, that the serpentinous 
rocks of Connemara which contain Eoozoon are certainly of Laurentian age, 
and that long before other geologists had imagined it he had pointed out the 
fact. Strange to say, however, in the April number of the periodical to 
which we refer, the writer makes the following recantation : — “ On reviewing 
my notes upon and sections of the Connemara mountains of Ireland (made 
in 1851) I am quite satisfied that the green serpentinous marble of that dis- 
trict in which a foraminifer, supposed to be Eoozoon Canadense, is found, 
is unquestionably of Lower Silurian age, and is not as was surmised it 
might prove to be, a true Laurentian rock.” Sir Eoderick does not consider 
that the presence of Eoozoon is any argument against his view, for it is known 
that a Glohigerina which lived in the cretaceous age is still alive. 
The burning Well at Broseley.- — Mr. John Eandall, F.G.S., writes to the 
Geological Magazine anent this extinct petroleum spring. The so-called 
burning well has ceased to exist for nearly a century. It was fed by a spring, 
and petroleum and naptha also found their way from rents in the rock into 
the water of the well. Springs of petroleum on a much larger scale are met 
with in the neighbourhood, and the yield of them was formerly much greater 
than at present. Many hogsheads from one of these were exported some 
years ago under the name of “ Betton’s British Oil.” The rocks were tapped 
by driving a level through one of the sandstone rocks of the coal measures ; 
but these are now drained, and very little is found to flow from them. 
The Origin of the Salt in the Dead Sea. — One of our most distinguished 
explorers of the Holy Land attributes the intensely saline character of the 
Dead Sea to the hill of Jebell Usdum. This is a huge ridge of salt, about a 
mile wide, and running H.E. and S.W. for a distance of three miles' and a 
half, then due N. and S. for four miles further. It is situated near the 
southern extremity of the Dead Sea, and renders that portion of it much 
more salt than the northern portion. Further, Mr. Tristram thinks that it is 
the proximate cause of the saltness of the Dead Sea, the drainage to which 
has been dissolving away portions of salt, and carrying it to the Dead Sea 
ever since the elevation of the ridge of Akabah separated the latter from the 
Eed Sea, or since the desiccation of the ocean, which existed to the Eocene 
period, presuming (which seems most probable) that the fissures of the Ghor 
were of submarine origin, and that the valley itself was, during the Tertiary 
period, the northernmost of a series of African lakes, of which the Eed Sea 
was the next. — Vide Geological Magazine, June, 1865. 
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