ical map of the Territories of the United States, west of the 94th meridian, by F. V. Hayden; Some remarks on an investigation of the laws of heredity, undertaken by the Board of Health of Massachusetts, by A. Hyatt; On the physical structure and hypsometry of the western Catskills, with some remarks on the whole group, by A. Guyot.

NEW YORK ACADEMY OF SCIENCES-October 14. Prof. A. A. Julien read a paper on "Chemical erosion on mountain summits," in which he presented a large number of facts, drawn from personal observation among the mountains of North Carolina, and the Catskills and the Shawaugunks of New York, indicating the existence of a powerful agency of chemical erosion in connection with vegetable acids. He recalled the recently published articles of Prof. H. C. Bolton, read before the Academy, on the action of organic acids upon minerals, and their use as tests and reagents in mineralogy, and then presented his own observations, as tending to show that like processes are going on in nature on a great scale, particularly through the action of lunnic, intro-lunnic and ulmic acids upon silica. He described in detail the remarkable erosion of the Shawaugunk Grit, along the precipitous edge of the mountains of that name, in situations and ways which indicate that it can be only due to decomposing vegetation. The paper was discussed at length, and generally regarded as possessing great significance. November 4. Prof. W. P. Trowbridge made a communication regarding disputed questions in animal locomotion.

AMERICAN GEOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY.-November 12. Rear Admiral Daniel Ammen, U. S. N., read a paper upon the proposed inter-ocean ship canal across the American Isthmus, between Greytown and Brits, via Lake Nicaragua; its feasibility as a commercial question, and its advantages as compared with other proposed routes.

BOSTON SOCIETY OF NATURAL HISTORY.-October 16. Prof. N. S. Shaler remarked on certain peculiarities in the structure of the swamp cypress (Taxodium distichum).

November 6. Mr. M. P. Kennard described the recently discovered glacial relics at Lucerne, Switzerland.

APPALACHIAN MOUNTAIN CLUB.-November 13. Prof. E. T. Quimby read a paper on Sun telegraphing, and Prof. E. C. Pickering remarked on a proposed system of mountain signalling.

-:0:

SCIENTIFIC SERIALS1

THE GEOGRAPHICAL MAGAZINE.-November.

The Afghan

passes (with a map of the Kaibar, Karkatcha and Kurram passes), by Trelawny Saunders. The Kuldja Question. Explorations in Greenland, by R. Brown. M. Ujfalvy's Travels in Central Asia. THE GEOLOGICAL MAGAZINE.-November. The general history of the Cephalopoda, recent and fossil, by Miss A. Crane.

1 The articles enumerated under this head are usually selected.