64 (Review of decent Literature. 
Ohio canal now lie, and the water passing by this channel reached the 
Tiiscarawas and when the Muskingum, on its way to the Ohio. Evidence 
of the existence of this lake is found in the deposits left in the valley of 
the river which are described in detail. 
The third stage in this story commenced when the ice-sheet had so 
far retreated as to cause the confluence of all these glacial lakelets and 
the formation of a single, but much more extensive, sheet of water in 
their place — the forerunner of the present lake Erie. At this time the 
edge of the ice was to the north of the lakes and the St. Lawrence, in 
Canada. The altitude of the surface of this lake and its place of over- 
flow are discussed and its great extent is pointed out. The gradual 
changes produced by the slow but steady withdrawal of the ice from the 
face of the covintry are explained and the results are traced in some de- 
tail. The influence of the high and cold area of the Adirondacks in 
preventing the outflow of the water of this compound " lake Erie-On- 
tario" and the successive stages whereby the drainage was gradually 
developed in its present direction along the St. Lawrence valley, are 
shown. 
All these various stages in the evolution of the existing physical geog- 
raphy of the country are illustrated with four colored maps, showing, in 
as many colors, the extent of the water, the ice and the land, at each suc- 
cessive stage. Of course such representations are and must be only 
approximate in the present imperfect state of our knowledge of the 
subject. Full details can only be supplied hereafter. 
The work aims merely at being a summary of the present state of our 
knowledge of this interesting geological study. It groups in a syste- 
matic scheme many of the wide-spread evidences that are legible 
from the drift itself, of the local superficial action of water on the 
till deposits. It seems to be one of the final steps in the demolition 
of the oceanic-iceberg-theory as to the origin of the drift; since it 
explains on the hypothesis of the continental glacier nearly all the 
anomalous facts that have been advanced in favor of the ice-berg 
theory. It is one of those reservoirs from which the amateur and teach- 
ing geologist can draw important information, which will be needed in 
the class-room. 
The West Amerkaii Scientist, a foptdar rcvie-v and record for America; 
official organ of the San Diego (California) Society of Natural History. 
This publication, which is well edited, is in its third volume. Mr. C. R. 
Orcutt, the editor, is preparing an international scientist's directory for 
the year 1888. 
Bulletin No. jg of the publications of the United States geological sur- 
vey, is by Mr. Warren Upham. It gives a preliminary account of the 
upper beaches and deltas of the glacial lake Agassiz, embracing a pro- 
fusion of details respecting the position, altitude, and external appear- 
ances of these breaches, so far as they exist in Minnesota and Dakota. 
The beaches that are described are the Herman, the Norcross, the 
Campbell and the Mc Caule^'ville beaches, the highest being the Her- 
