Review of Recent Geological Literature. 341 
The hight of this mountain which has been so long in doubt has been 
measured by Mr. Russell as closely as was possible with the means at 
his command, and found to be 18,100 feet, with a possible error of 100 
feet. This, with one exception, that of the U.S. Coast Survey, which 
gave 19,500 feet, is the greatest hight that has been assigned to this 
peak. Other estimates have varied from 12,672 feet upwards. Its posi- 
tion as determined by Mr. Russell is just within the U. 8. frontier and 
he calls it a corner monument of the national domain. 
Parka decipiens by Str J. W. Dawson and Pror. D. P. PENnHALLOW. 
In a memoir presented to the Royal Society of Canada this problematic 
organism is well discussed by both these writers. Parka so well named 
decipiens has been an object of controversy ever since its first description 
in 1831. Regarded by Dr. Fleming as a seed this view was confirmed by 
later observers, especially by Hugh Miller. ‘Then the opinion was ad- 
vanced apparently by Lyell, that these bodies were the eggs of some mol- 
luse such as Natica, or of some crustacean such as Pterygotus, the latter 
of which was frequently found in the same beds. Other writers fol- 
lowing these adopted apparently without original investigation, the same 
view. Having received from Scotland some fresh specimens of Parka, 
these were made the subject of a careful investigation by the two botan- 
ists named, and their deliberate conclusion reverses the latter and recurs 
to the earlier view of their nature. Judging from the statements that 
they make, and the figures given therewith, little room for doubt re- 
mains as to the accuracy of this determination. They make the species 
and two varieties media and minor. 
In another pamphlet reprinted from‘the Canadian Record of Science, 
Prof. Penhallow establishes also on material received from Scotland the 
genus Zosterophyllum with one species Wyretonianum, found associated 
with Purka decipiens in Devonian rocks, in Caithness. He also describes 
a Lycopodites (milleri) from the same beds. 
Prof. Penhallow also describes in the same transactions two specimens 
of semifossil wood from the Post-glacial beds of Dlinois. To one of 
these he applies the name Quercus marcyana from Prof. Marcy of Evans- 
ton, who sent him the material and to the other that of Pdcew evunstoni 
from the place where both were found. The pine occurred in a thin 
layer of peat immediately overlying the boulder-clay, and apparently in 
the place of its original growth. The oak lay at a higher level in sand, 
and had probably been floated to the place. Both trees were in the 
lowest of the three lake-ridges at Chicago, near the spot from which 
some years ago the bones of a mastodon were exhumed. 
Altitudes between Lake Superior and the Rocky Mountains. By WARREN 
UpnHam. pp. 229. (Bulletin No. 72, U.S. Geological Survey, 1891. Price 
20 cents.) The altitudes of railway stations, summits, bridges, and low 
and high water of streams are here tabulated, with distances in miles 
and tenths, compiled from the profiles of about 18,500 miles of railway 
lines in Minnesota, North and South Dakota, Montana, and portions of 
