Review of Recent Geological Literature. 249 
geologists who have for years been longing to see the unravel- 
ling of the mysteries of the "Quebec" as well as of the intimately 
allied and "Taconic" controversies. 
At the end of Part II is placed a general index of all these memoirs, 
each being distinguished by a letter affixed to its pagination. The 
whole volume presents a vast amount of well arranged information, 
and reflects great credit on the director and his assistants in this 
Survey. 
On the Fossil Plants in the Ravenhead Collection in the Free Library 
and Museum, Liverpool. By Robert Kidston. Trans. Roy. Soc. Edin- 
burgh, vol. XXXV, 1889, part II, No. 10, pp. 391-417, 2 plates. 
Mr. Robert Ividston'a memoir on the fossil plants in the Ravenhead 
collection is a valuable addition to the important series of comparative 
studies of the Carboniferous floras of which his Catalogue of the Pal- 
eezoic Plants in the British Museum (1886) was the first and an earnest 
of those to follow. The Ravenhead collection, from the middle or pro- 
ductive Coal Measures, which was made the subject of two papers by 
Higgins and Marrat in 1871-'72, and which is the most important col- 
lection of plants from the southwestern Lancashire Coalfield, has been 
twice carefully studied by Mr. Kidston, the identifications and results 
being now given, together with a detailed description of the local stra- 
tigraphy of the Carboniferous, in the present illustrated paper. 
Among the revised species it is interesting to note the identification of 
Neuropteris dentata Lesq. and Sphenopteris mixta Schimp., the identity 
of the latter being ascertained from a specimen from the Sub-carboni- 
ferous of Clinton, Mo., sent to the author by Mr. Lacoe. A number of 
generic changes were found necessar}^, but Sphenopteris marratii is the 
only new species described. Mr. Kidston is thoroughly familiar with 
the literature, and is painstaking in his extensive comparisons and cor- 
relations. It may be added also that he, more than any other European 
paleobotanist, has recognized the work of Lesquereux and Newberry 
in our American coal flora, and is giving more attention to the correla- 
tions of the American species with those found in the European coal 
fields. 
Transactions of the twentieth and twenty-first Annual Meeting of the 
Kansas Academy of Science, 1887-88. Vol. xi. 1889, 8vo. 127 pp. 
Topeka. 
The regular appearance of the volumes of the Kansas Academy, and 
their scientific value, are highly creditable to that western State, and 
they furnish evidence that the energetic spirit of her early settlers, in 
taking on the forms of a more varied pursuit has not lost its prestine 
vigor. 
Of geological papers Prof. Robert Hay contributes one on "The 
horizon of the Dacotah lignite," in which he shows that this lignite is 
in the upper part of the Dacotah group, and not more than fifty feet 
