Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 51.djvu/290

280 Polytechnic Institute, Terre Haute, Ind.: Fifteenth Annual Catalogue, 1807. Pp. 83.—Smithsonian Institution: Report of the Board of Regents for 1895). Pp. 837.—Society for Psychical Research: Proceedings. March, 1897. Pp. 20.—United States Commission of Fish and Fisheries: Report for 1895. Pp. 590; Illustrations showing Condition of Fur Seal Rookeries in 1895. and Method of Killing Seals: to accompany Report of C. H. Townsend, Assistant Fish Commissioner. 42 plates.

Reprints. Babcock, Warren I.: "From Demoniacal Possession to Insanity." Pp. 6.—Bauer, L. A.: On the Distribution and the Secular Variation of Terrestrial Magnetism. No. IV. Pp. 8.—Boas, Franz: Traditions of the Ts'ets'ãut. II. Pp. 14.—Bolton, Prof. H. Carrington: The Language used in Talking to Domestic Animals. Washington. Pp. 47. Call, R. Ellsworth: Note on the Flora of Mammoth Cave, Kentucky. Pp. 2.—Diller, J. S.: Crater Lake, Oregon. Pp. 8—Fairchild, H. L.: Lake Warren Shorelines in Western New York and the Geneva Beach; and Gilbert, G. K.: Old Tracks of Erian Drainage in Western New York. Rochester, N. Y. Pp. 20.—Grimsley, G. P.: The Study of Natural Palimpsests. Pp. 7.—Hollick, Arthur: The Cretaceous Clay Marl Exposure at Cliffwood, N. J. Pp. 12, with plates.—Insect Life. General Index to the Seven Volumes. Pp. 145.—Johnson, Henry L. E.: Appendicitis, etc. Pp. 12; A Case of Pyosalpinx, etc. Pp. 4.—Kemp, J. F.: The Leucite Hills of Wyoming. Pp. 16, and the Geology of the Magnetites near Fort Henry, N. Y. Pp. 68, with map.—Mason, Otis Tufton: Influence of Environment upon Human Industries or Arts.

Pp. 16.—Miller, Gerrit S.: Notes on the Mammals of Ontario. Pp. 44.—Ward, Lester F.: Individual Telesis. Pp. 20.

Schimmel & Co. (Fritsche Brothers). Leipzig and New York. Semiannual Report, April, 1897. (Chemical Extracts.) Pp. 53, with map.

Storer, P. H. Agriculture in some of its Relations with Chemistry. Seventh edition, revised and enlarged. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons. Three vols. Pp. 620, 602, 679. $5.

Thayer, Alexander Wheelock. The Hebrews in Egypt and their Exodus. Peoria: E. S. Willcox. Pp. 315. $1.25.

United States Geological Survey. Geologic Atlas of the United States. Yellowstone National Park Folio, Wyoming. Pp. 6 text, 3 views, 4 maps.

United States Hydrographic Office. Classification of Clouds for the Weather Observers of the Office. One-sheet chart.

Vincent. Frank. The Plant World; its Romances and Realities. New York: D. Appleton & Co. Pp. 228. 60 cents.

Webster, Arthur Gorman. The Theory of Electricity and Magnetism. New York: The Macmillan Company. Pp. 376. $3.50.

Wiedemann, Alfred. Religion of the Ancient Egyptians. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. Pp. 324.

Williams, George A. Topics and References in American History. With numerous Search Questions. Syracuse, N. Y.: C. W. Bardeen. Pp. 176. $1.



Large Trees from the Coal Period.—The approach from the south to La Grange, Ala., is marked by the fine view into the valley of the Tennessee River, three or four hundred feet below, which it presents, and by the masses of sandstone lying around the village, where it has been precipitated from the cliffs above by the wearing away of the limestone under them. But the most interesting and remarkable feature of the locality, says Mr. Henry McCalley, in his geological report of the valley region, and the one for which La Grange will always be distinguished, is the profusion of the remains of fossil plants. Nowhere can one gain better ideas of the magnificence of the flora of the coal period than at this place. Trunks of Lepidodendron, two or three feet in diameter, lie buried and protruding from the débris of the sandstone. These trunks have in general preserved their form and are not at all compressed, whereby they show that they stood erect in the beds that inclosed them. Although stripped of their bark, the scars are plainly impressed on their surface. Two very fine specimens of these trunks are in the cabinet of the Geological Survey at the State University. One of them represents the lower part of the trunk, and has two large roots attached. The other has been used as a horse block, is about three feet in diameter and four feet high, and is remarkable for the impressions of calamites and other plants of which the sandstone composing it is full. The supposition is drawn from them that, in the process of petrifaction, the interior of the trunk was removed by decay or otherwise, leaving a hollow cylinder of the outer layers of the trunk, and that this hollow cylinder was filled up with sand and fragments of calamites and other coal plants, which subsequently hardened.

The Moki Indians and their Birds.—The Moki Indians are described, in Dr. E. A. Mearns's paper on the names of their birds, as having a superstititioussuperstitious [sic] regard for most living things, particularly as holding serpents in reverence and a number of birds as 