REVIEWS. 
413 
the simplest form, so as to be easily understood by the general reader, we 
are thus presented, under each of the counties surveyed, with their physical 
features, the general and economical geology, the minerals found, the nature 
of the soils, the timber, the various mineral springs, and the supplies of 
water. The chief geological formations of the State, besides the occurrence 
of granite and porphyry, are of Palaeozoic age, including the Silurian, De- 
vonian, and Carboniferous strata ; the Mesozoic rocks do not appear to be 
represented, the more recent or quarternary accumulations belonging to the 
drift, bluff, and alluvium. The Missouri coal-field is estimated at about 
23,100 square miles ; the upper measures, about 8,000 square miles, are 
mostly barren of coal, or only contain an occasional seam too thin to pay for 
working. The extent and character of the coal formations are more fully 
treated in each of the county reports. Besides a great amount of informa- 
tion embodied under the respective counties surveyed by Mr. G. C. Broad- 
head and Mr. Norwood, the latter half of the volume contains an elaborate 
account of the lead and zinc regions of the Central and South-western 
Missouri, by Adolph Schmidt and Alexander Leonhard, giving their general 
characteristics, and special descriptions of the ores and associated minerals, 
their mode of occurrence and nature of the deposits, and of the mining and 
smelting of them. There is also a report on the iron ores of South-eastern 
Missouri by Mr. Moore, of the history of lead mining by Mr. Cobb, and of 
the lead mines of Upper Louisiana by Mr. Austin, and of the chemical work 
and analysis done in connection with the survey by M. Chauvenet. The 
work is further illustrated by ninety-one figures of the deposits of ore, and 
an atlas of maps and coal sections of the counties explored. 
HE international scientific series of works which has been commenced by 
Messrs. King and Co. is, so far as we have seen the books, unsatisfactory 
on the whole. We think there has been an absence of scientific judgment 
in the selection of some of the subjects, and we might add also of some of 
the writers. There are, in the entire set of works which have been issued, 
very few which have a real value. Unquestionably, however, some of the 
books have been excellent in character, and we wish we could say the same 
for the volume under notice at present. Professor Whitney has, we believe, 
written an earlier and a better work on the subject of language ; but 
assuredly he has in the present instance done, we might say, nothing towards 
producing a book which in any way gives a proper idea of the subject. It 
is simply ludicrous to observe the manner in which he apologises to his 
readers for want of space in which to place his ideas fully before them. 
Why, the book is nothing more than “words, words, words.” It assuredly 
is worthy of its title in so far as it simply illustrates “ the growth of 
* “The Life and Growth of Language.” By William Dwight Whitney, 
Professor of Philology in Yale College. King and Co. 1875. 
THE SCIENCE OF LANGUAGE.* 
