196 The American Geologist. March, 1901. 
tram road there are eight great railways engaged in the ore 
business hauling cars loaded with 50 tons each behind locomo- 
tives of 240,000 pounds weight. Instead of the 700-ton ships, 
those of the beginning of the new century carry 7,000 or 8,000 
tons, and instead of consuming four or five days in loading and 
unloading they are loaded in two hours and emptied in ten. In- 
stead of ten to twelve trips a year they are making twenty to 
twenty-five. In connection with this, instead of old time prices 
ore is now bringing on lake Erie docks little more than the act- 
ual mining cost of early years, and in the past three years has 
actually sold when delivered at Cleveland at less than the min- 
ing expenses of as late as 1887. Not longer ago than 1871 a 
drift was driven at the Cleveland mine at a cost of $100 per 
foot. Now it could not cost $15. Nitro-glycerine and power 
drills have been the humanizing and civilizing agencies in great 
measure, and civilizing these have surely been, for where would 
be our supremacy today but for the reduction in costs they 
have brought about? — D. E. Woodbridge in Mines and Miner- 
als for February. 
Mr. Frank Leverett has completed and submitted for 
publication by the U. S. Geol. Sur., his second monograph: 
"The Glacial Formations and drainage features of the Erie and 
Ohio basins." 
The Field Columbian Museum has arranged a course of 
nine free lectures to be given in the Museum lecture-hall in 
March and April. These are to be illustrated by stereopticon 
views : The geological lectures are by Dr. E. R. Buckley and 
Prof. Wm. H. Hobbs. 
Science Club of Northwestern University. At the 
meeting of February ist Prof. U. S. Grant spoke on "Some 
methods of geological field work," and at the meeting of March 
1st Prof. A. R. Crook spoke on "Minerals of the Chicago area." 
Geological Society of Washington. The following 
was the program of the meeting held February 27th : "Me- 
morial of Thomas Benton Brooks," Bailey Willis ; "Morpho- 
geny of southern Alaska," G. K. Gilbert ; "Mountain structure 
in the trans-Pecos province," Robert T. Hill. 
The Geological Survey of Georgia has just issued Bul- 
letin No. 10 — A, entitled "A preliminary report on a part of the 
iron ores of Georgia, Polk, Barton and Floyd counties." The 
report is made by Mr. S. W. McCallie, assistant geologist. 
Mr. F. a. Lucas, geologist of Washington, D. C, who fias 
been drilling for oil in Texas for about two years, was re- 
warded by the discovery, on Jan. 10, of a great oil basin. The 
flow of oil at Beaumont is said to be greater than from any 
single well ever sunk in the United States. It is estimated by 
experts that every twenty-four hours it flowed 20,000 barrels 
of oil, and that 150,000 barrels escaped from it before the flow 
