EVOLUTION OF SCIENTIFIC SERIALS. 229 
leading features of each serial, and the relations of all the 
serials issued by the eight societies, viewed as units or indi¬ 
viduals. It is at the same time a graphic representation of 
the leading bibliographic facts connected with the serials. 
The Evolution of the Serials. 
Even a cursory glance at the diagram or at the publica¬ 
tions it represents discovers certain general tendencies toward 
stability or instability in each serial, and these tendencies 
become more manifest when the various serials are care¬ 
fully scrutinized. A few of these may be mentioned : 
Perhaps the most obvious tendency is that toward unifica¬ 
tion in form and functions of serials; and this tendency is ex¬ 
hibited alike in the history of the various serials issued by any 
of the older societies, and by comparison of the serials of the 
old with those of the newer societies. Thus, the Geological 
Society of London maintained during its youth two or three 
serials, and even after the abandonment of all but the 
Quarterly Journal adhered for years to a refined differentia¬ 
tion of matter in each volume expressed by the five, seven, 
or more paginations. Quite similar is the history of publica¬ 
tion by the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, 
which after getting well under way supported distinct serials 
for the records of research and administration respectively ; 
and after the latter partly absorbed the former it dis¬ 
played an analagous differentiation of matter in multiple 
paginations and in other ways. The tendency is equally 
shown by the decadence of the 4to serials issued by the 
American Association for the Advancement of Science, the 
Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, and the Boston 
Society of Natural History. The same tendency also appears 
when the Philosophical Society of Washington and the 
American Institute of Mining Engineers, each with a single 
serial (if the preliminary edition of the papers of the latter 
Society be disregarded), and the vigorous American Society 
of Civil Engineers, with its two serials, are compared with 
the older societies; for the newer societies appear to have 
27—Bull. Phil. Soe., Wash., Vol. 11. 
