148 Tlte A'inerivan Geologist. September, isy* 
known. This species will be readily recognized by its elliptical 
section, its oblique, closely crowded septa, and its large, internal, 
rapidly tapering siphuncle. 
The specific name is given in honor of Mr. F. H. Luthe, of 
McGregor, Iowa, to whose skill and enthusiasm scifence is in- 
debted for valuable additions to our knowledge of the fauna of the 
Lower Ma^nesian limestone in the valley of the Upper Mississippi. 
The collection contains fragments of other species that will 
sometime, we hope, be represented by identifiable specimens. 
In general aspect this fauna resembles that of the Calciferous 
sand- rock about lake Champlain. The identity of the species in 
some cases and the close resemblance in others, leaves little doubt 
as to the exact equivalency of the Lower Magnesian limestone 
of Iowa with the Calciferous series of northeastern New York. 
Geological Laboratory ^ University of Iowa, May 25, 1892. 
THE SCOPE OF PALEONTOLOGY AND ITS VALUE 
TO GEOLOGISTS. 
Address before Section E., A. A. A. S., Aug. 17, 1892, by H. S.Williams, 
New Haven, Conn. 
The scientific study of fossils is scarcely a century old. It 
was in 1796 that Cuvier for the first time ventured to say that 
certain fossil bones found in the Paris basin represented an ex- 
tinct species of elephant. 
About the year 1819, William Smith became famous by prov- 
ing that rock strata could be traced across the country by their 
fossils, that at each outcrop across miles of interval a stratum 
could be recognized by the identity of the fossil shells it contained. 
Previous to this', fossils had been regarded as curiosities. 
Cuvier and Smith made it clear that fossils tell us of organisms 
of whose existence or nature we should otherwise be ignorant, and 
that the kinds of organism are, somehow, related to the diflferent 
strata of rocks. 
Deshayes who was a friend of Lamarck, and Lyell, and a little 
later, William Lonsdale were among the first to demonstrate the 
wide scope of paleontology and its inestimable importance in the 
interpretation of the problems of geology. 
Lyell tells us in his "Antiquity of Man, "(p. 3), of the method 
he employed in determining the subdivisions of the Tertiary: 
"When engaged in 1828" (he writes) "in preparing for the press 
the treatise on geology, above alluded to [the third volume of 
