Personal and Scioitific Nczvs. •201 
considered that this by any means completes the list of possible species 
that might be found in the spring. The flora as a whole is distinctly 
that of a morainal country, and its nearest analogue is that of Montauk 
point. 
Mr. Hollick then ofYered some suggestions to account for the present 
peculiar flora of the island, and particularly for the absence of certain 
impedes that would be expected, and showed that two features are to be 
taken into consideration: the geological and the human. Block island 
is the only part of the terminal moraine along the New England coast 
which does not have accompanying the moraine a certain amount of 
plain land, which would naturally allow a variety in the Hora. It is 
presumable that Block island also has been practically separated from 
the rest of the continent by a deep channel of more than twenty fathoms 
for a considerable time, and that even before the last depression of 
land, the island was connected to the mainland merely by a small penin- 
sula, and hence the diversity of the flora as compared with the conti- 
nent because of the length of separation. The speaker also mentioned 
■extensive archaeological discoveries on the west shore of the island, 
and gave a list of the shells and implements discovered in several of the 
kitchen middens, and also of the bones of animals brought to light in 
the old fireplaces in the sand dunes. He made particular mention also 
•of the great number of Littorina, the common periwinkle of Europe 
which has never before been announced from Block island. The paper 
was discussed by Prof. Lloyd and Dr. Martin. 
The second paper of the evening was by the secretar)', 
■entitled "Scientific geography in education." 
The speaker brought out the point that geography work may be 
classified into three divisions: that for the common schools, the sec- 
ondary schools and the universities, and outlined briefly a few sug- 
gestions as to how the subject matter might be treated scientifically 
in each of the groups, and the dependence of each group upon the 
others. He paid particular attention to the difficulties of securing scien- 
tific work in geography in the grade schools, and to the fact that the 
present work is extremely unsatisfactory in most of our schools, prob- 
ably because of the lack of inspiration owing to the neglect of the sub- 
ject hitherto in universities of the country. The paper was illustrated 
by exhibition of cheap and easily procurable maps, that may be used for 
scientific geography work of several grades. 
The meeting then closed with a few remarks b\' the chair- 
man in reference to the famous classic entitled "Lithograph- 
iae Wircenburgensis dacentis lapidum figuratorum, a potiori 
insectiformium prodigiosis imaginibus exornat;^, specimen 
primum," written by Dr. Beringer and published in VViirtz- 
burg in 1726. Prof. Kemp summarized the work of the 
author in attempting to explain a great collection of pseudo- 
fossils from a theological standpoint, the fossils having pre- 
\ioush' been made by some practical jokers and buried in 
the rocks for the author to find. Richard E. Dodge, Secretary. 
Prof. Wilbur C. Knight of the University of Wyo- 
ming, at Laramie, has been appointed state geologist' of 
Wyoming. 
Geological Society of Washington. At the meeting 
of February 9th, the following papers were presented: 
Remarks on the classifiration of igneous rocks. H. W. Turner. 
