lis The American Geologist. August, 1893 
Omitting other misquotations and misstatements, we will 
refer t<> only one more. Major Powell, in speaking of Prof. 
Wright's book, says il \v;is widely advertised and circulated 
"ms the greatest contribution that had ever been made to 
glacial geology;" We do not recollect having ever seen any 
such advertisement or anything even remotely approaching to 
a similar description of the work. Nor do we believe that any 
such claim lias been put forward on its behalf by any one. 
least of all by its author. Had any pretentious assertion of 
this kind been made, it would assuredly deserve severe con- 
demnation from Major Powell or anyone else. 
Into the vexed question of Prof. Wright's connection with 
the U. S. Geological Survey we will not enter. It seems to 
us that the sensitiveness manifested on this point by some of 
the disputants is quite superfluous ; that the dates which have 
been published effectually dispose of all ground for objection 
and that it is scarcely consistent to profess a desire to disown 
a worker while making so free a use of the results of his 
work. 
REVIEW OF RECENT GEOLOGICAL 
LITERATURE. 
Continental Problems: Annual Address by the President, G. K. 
Gilbert. Bulletin of the Geological Society of America, vol. iv, p. 179- 
190, with five figures in the text; February 27, 1893. This paper states 
the principal problems relating to the origin and history of the earth's 
continental plateaus which are expected to have a prominent place 
among the themes of discussion by the International Congress of Geol- 
ogists in its session as one of the auxiliaries of the World's Fair,during the 
closing part of this month. About two-fifths of the surface of our globe 
are depressed between 11,000 and 16,000 feet below the sea level, forming 
the deep, somewhat uniform ocean beds; and one-fourth lies between 
the contour 5,000 feet above the sea level and the contour 1,000 feet 
below it, having a mean altitude of about 1,000 feet and forming the 
continental plateaus. Two answers are given to the question: How are 
the continents held up? The first regards the earth's mass as so rigid 
that it is strong enough to sustain the vast weight of the continents 
above the low ocean basins; while the second, which Mr. Gilbert thinks 
more probable, supposes the density and therefore weight of the conti- 
nents and of underlying portions of the earth's crust to some undeter- 
mined depth to be less than of the portions beneath the oceans, so that 
