228 
MCGEE. 
when a third, designed to combine the functions of the new and 
part of the old, was initiated as a Quarterly Journal; but as 
the years went by this periodical, following the parricidal ex¬ 
ample of the Proceedings, finally absorbed the entire vitality 
of the Transactions, and is now a combined record of re¬ 
search and administration of so long standing that it is prob¬ 
ably the best known geologic serial in the libraries of the 
world. But with the growth of the serial its character has 
undergone modification, and for years it has contained elabo¬ 
rate illustrated papers which can only be published after con¬ 
siderable delay; and that it has in consequence failed to 
meet certain of its requirements as an administrative record 
is indicated by the issue of the little known series of Ab¬ 
stracts, designed for local and temporary use only. 
In brief, these eight societies are now regularly issuing 
nineteen serials (excluding the Memoirs of the A. A. A. S., 
the Annual Report of the Acad. Nat. Sci. Phil., the Proceed¬ 
ings of the Annual Meetings of the Boston Soc. Nat. Hist, 
and the Occasional Papers of the same Society, but includ¬ 
ing the 2° Journal of the Academy of Nat. Sci. of Phil., 
the Memoirs of the Boston Soc. Nat. Hist., the Anni¬ 
versary Memoirs of the same Society, and the Abstracts 
of the Geol. Soc. of London); and they have published in all, 
for greater or less periods, forty different serials (including 
the Eng. and Min. Jour., the Annual Reports and Reports of 
Proceedings of the Nat. Acad, of Sci., the two distinct series 
of the Journal of the Acad, of Nat. Sci. Phil., the Annual 
Reports and tl^e Reports of Trustees of the same Society, the 
sub-reports extracted from the Proceedings of the Boston 
Soc. Nat. Hist., and the Abstracts of the Geol. Soc. of London), 
comprising about 315 volumes. These various serials, with 
the periods covered by each, the regularity or irregularity 
of issue, their form and size (8vo or smaller, 4to or larger), 
and the volumes and in some cases the parts issued, are 
represented in the accompanying diagram. This diagram 
thus represents salient points in the life-history and the 
