118 T}(e American Geologist. August, i89i 
locality there is an overthrust fault, with liorizontal displacoment of 
about one mile. As to the nature of the disturbances which in late 
Tertiary time and at its end formed the system of the Coast ranges, this 
author believes, with Whitney, that they were "sudden and sharp, so 
that the result may be called a crushing and breaking rather than an 
uplifting and folding." 
Two belts nf foxslUfcroiis hlack s?i/(7c in the Triaxsic ftirmation nf Con- 
necticut. By W. M. Davis and S. Wahd Loi'ER. Bulletin, G. S, A. vol. 
ii, pp, 415-430, with three figures: April 9, 18iil. Professor Davis dur- 
ing tne past nine years has given much study to the Triassic area of the 
Connecticut valley, and the first part of this memoir gives a summary of 
his conclusions, as published more fully in earlier papers, concerning 
the structure of the Triassic formation, with its several trap sheets, in 
the vicinity of Meriden. Three principal overflows of lava, named by 
Percival the anterior, main, and posterior trap sheets, are interbedded 
with the upper half of the conglomerates, sandstones and shales; and 
besides at least one great intrusive sheet is found, its position being be- 
low the overflow and near tlie base of the formation ( Am. Geologist, 
vol. iv, p. 112). The epoch of deposition was terminated by an upheaval, 
in which the whole series of aqueous and igneous beds were tilted and 
faulted, being divided into long narrow blocks, from an eighth of a mile 
to a mile or more in width, with dislocations of upthrow on the south- 
east side of the fractures, varying from a few tens of feet up well to- 
ward 2,000 feet. Denudation ensued during the Jurassic and Cretaceous 
periods, reducing this broken country to a surface of moderate relief and 
low altitude ; but about the beginning of the Tertiary era it was again 
elevated, and the present hills formed by the outcropping edges of the 
trap sheets are partial measures of the extent of erosion since that time. 
These interpretations of the structure and history of the area have 
enabled the authors to discover a considerable number of new localities 
of the two fossiliferous horizonsof black shales which were before known 
in Durham and Westfield. The extreme points at which the Durham or 
lower bed has been thus identified are about fifteen miles apart, with 
ten well proved faults between them : while fossiliferous outcrops prob- 
ably belonging to the Westfield or upper bed are found in places sep- 
arated by fifty miles and by twelve or more faults. 
The greater part of the search for fossils has been done by Mr. Loper, 
who describes his methods of work and the localities which have been 
successfully explored. His provisional list of species comprises eleven 
fishes and ten plants, with others undetermined; and the search has 
yielded about 450 specimens of fossils, in addition to the many hundred 
which had been previously collected in Durham. Five species of fish 
and five of plants are common to both the lower and upper fossiliferous 
belts, which are here caUed respectively anterior and the posterior black 
shale, from the nearly associated trap sheets. 
Pdntobihlion. An "internatioiuil bibliograpliical review of the world's 
scientific literature." 
This is a very comprehensive and ambitious new journal, at least in 
the scope which it proposes to cover. It is edited by A. Kersha, C. E., 
