bodies projecting through the wide openings of the segmental tubes into the body-cavity."

THE HESSIAN FLY.--The object of this and several of the Bulletins issued by the Entomological Commission is not so much to show evidence of special and new field studies or for the display of entomological learning, as to set forth well-known facts regarding the more injurious insects and the best means of combating them, and to place the results in the hands of those most interested, i. e., the farmers, The Bulletins so far issued by the Department of the Interior, have rapidly gone out of print, and fresh editions furnished either by the Department or by Congress. It was contemplated to issue others, and this could have been done, with little expense to the country and without detriment to the objects for which the Entomological Commission was working, i. e., the thorough investigation of the locust plague and the depredations of the cotton-worm; but such a design was considered unlawful and nefarious by the Commissioner of Agriculture, and every effort was made by that enlightened official, aided by his entomologist, to not only stop the issue of such bulletins as the one before us, but to extinguish the Commission outright. While Congress voted larger appropriations than ever before to the Commission, the immediate result of Gen. Le Duc's labors was to restrict the labors of the Commission for the coming year to the locust and cotton-worm. All this is directly in the line pursued by some of our former agricultural commissioners, and evinces the wisdom of political appointments, i. e., of exjudges and railroad contractors, for a position which could be made one of great importance and usefulness if worthily filled,

The plate reproduced gives an idea of the Hessian fly and its transformations, and its chief parasite, the Semiotellus destructor. Not much, though some new matter has been added to what was previously known as to the habits of this insect or the remedies against its attacks, but the chronological table of years of abundance of the Hessian fly, may prove of interest as well as the bibliographical list.

Department of the Interior. U. S. Entomological Commission. Bulletin No. 4. The Hessian Fly, its Ravages, Habits, Enemies and means of preventing its increase. By A. S. PACKARD, Jr. Washington, May 20, 1880. 8vo, pp. 43.

2 EXPLANATION OF THE PLATE.-A healthy stalk of wheat on the left, the one on the right dwarfed and the lower leaves beginning to wither and turn yellow; the stem swollen at three places near the ground where the flaxseed (4) are situated, between the stem and sheathing base of the leaf. a, egg of the Hessian fly (greatly enlarged, as are all the figures except e and ). b, the larva, enlarged, the line by the side, in this and other figures, showing the natural length. c, the flaxseed, puparium or pupa case d, the pupa or chrysalis. e, the Hessian fly, natural size, laying its eggs in the creases of the leaf. f, female Hessian fly, much enlarged. g, male Hessian fly, much enlarged. h, flaxseed between the leaves and stalk. i, chalcid or ichneumon parasite of the Hessian fly, male, enlarged.

A NEW GERMAN GEOGRAPHICAL JOURNAL,- This is a new periodical designed to present, from time to time, a brief but excellent digest of the progress of geographical science, with its literature. It is printed in large octavo form, with clean type and on excellent paper, so that it presents an excellent appearance. There are no less than twelve collaborators from all parts of Germany and Switzerland, representing some of the best known. geographers in Europe. In the third number there is a long account of the history of the Hayden Geological and Geographical Survey of the Territories, with the entire catalogue of publications printed in detail.

FAVRE'S GEOLOGY OF THE CANTON OF GENEVA.2-This important work of M. Favre may be regarded as an exhaustive monograph of the geological, archæological and agricultural resources of the Canton of Geneva, Switzerland,,and therefore local in its character. Local treatises of this kind are not uncommon in Europe; many of them have been written of limited areas in France, and it would be an advantage if studies of this kind were made of the more interesting and complicated districts in our own country.

The work commences with a preface and a preliminary chapter defining its object to be mainly the application of geology to agriculture. A chapter follows describing in a brief manner the elements of the science, and then the principal formations within the limits of the Canton, are noted in detail. The Quaternary and the present superficial formations are described in great detail and in a masterly manner. The portion treating of the glacial period is of great interest, and is well worthy of careful study.

Numerous analyses of rocks and soils are given, and a considerable portion of the book is devoted to a minute study of the rocks and minerals of the canton. At the end of Tome II are eight large folded plates of geological and archæological illustrations, finely engraved. Accompanying the work are four maps on a scale of 500, upon which the geology is shown in minute detail. The entire work is a contribution to science worthy of the illustrious author of "Recherches Geologique de la Savoie, du Piedmont et de la Suisse voisines du Mont Blanc."

RECENT BOOKS AND PAMPHLETS.—Manual of the New Zealand Mollusca. By Fred. W. Hutton. 8vo, pp. 224, 1880. From the author.

International Exhibition, Sydney. Appendix to Official Catalogue. 8vo, pp. 67, From the company.

1880.

1 Zeitschritt für wissenschaftliche Geographie. Edited by J. I. KETTLER, Lohr. in Baden, with the aid of numerous able Collaborators. Band 1, Het 1, 2, 3.

Description Géologique du Canton de Genève. Par ALPHONSE FAVRE, Professeur emerite a l'Academie de Geneve, Correspondant de l'Institut de France, pour servis a l'application de la Carte Geologique du meme auteur. Tomes 1 and 11, pp. 292. $1.50. (Extrait du Bulletin de la class d'Agriculture de la Societe des Arts de Geneve.)

West Tennessee: its Resources and Advantages. By J. B. Killebrew. 8vo, pp. 93, 1880. From the author.

On the Physical Structure and Hypsometry of the Catskill Mountain region. By Arnold Guyot. (From Amer. Jour. Sci., Vol. XIX, June, 1880.) 8vo, pp. 22, maps From the author.

2.

Geological and Natural History Survey of North Carolina. Part III-Botany. By M. A. Curtis. 8vo, pp. 156, 1867.

The Felsites and their Associated Rocks north of Boston. (From Proc. Boston Soc. Nat. Hist., Vol. xx, Jan. 21, 1880.) By J. S. Diller. 8vo, pp. 12, 1880. From the author.

Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia. 8vo, pp. 152, 10 pls. Pt. 1, 1880. From the academy.

Catalogue of North American Musci. Arranged by Eugene A. Rau and A. B. Hervey. 8vo, pp. 52, 1880. From the authors.

Korte Bidrag til nordisk Ichthyographi. III Gronlands og Islands Lycoder. Med Bemærkninger om andre nordiske Arter. (Aftryk af Vidensk. Meddel. fra den naturhist. Foren. i Kbhvn. 1879-1880.) By Dr. Chr. Lütken. 8vo, pp. 26, 1880. From the author.

Le Globe Lenox de 1511, Traduit de l'anglais par Gabriel Gravier. 8vo, pp. 26, 1880. From the author.

Découverte d'un Squelette entier de Rytiodus dans le Falun Aquitanien. (Ext. des Actes de la Société Linnéenne de Bordeaux.) Par M. E. Deltortrie. 4to, pp. 16, pls. 4, 1880. From the author.

The Orthonectida, a new class of the Phylum of the Worms. (From Quart. Journ. Micros. Sci.) By Alfred Giard. 8vo, pp. 15, pl. 1, 1880. From the author. Zur Anatomie und Physiologie des Nervensystems der Nemertinen, Von A. A. W. Hubrecht. 4to, pp. 47, pls. 4, 1880. From the author.

:0:

GENERAL NOTES.

BOTANY.

CHANGES IN PLANT LIFE ON THE SAN FRANCISCO PENINSULA.1We are not very apt to notice changes that gradually and progressively prepare themselves in our surroundings. We have no room in our journals for facts of every-day occurrence, and at the same time these gradual changes offer more analogies to the great secular changes that have preceded the present state of our globe, and give more material for the study of evolutions than all floods, earthquakes and other cataclysms,

All vegetation of our earth is subject to secular changes, and it is not necessary to go to the fossil plants, imbedded in coal, to find ample proofs for this axiom. The bogs of Northern Europe, the lacustrine dwellings of the Alpine regions, show in different strata the remainders of different forest trees; and in the Atlantic States many acute observers have noticed that the birch gradually supersedes the conifers.

Such a process of change, of course, is accelerated if to the secular process of change is added the powerful agent of human

1 The following essay, which will be of interest to all botanists and observers of plant growth generally, was read at the meeting of the Academy of Sciences, Feb. 2d, by Dr. Herman Behr, of San Francisco, and appeared in the Rural Press.

activity. I have had the good fortune to witness this process in two different quarters of the globe; in Australia and in California. The neighborhood of San Francisco and its flora in the year 1850 was not entirely in its natural state, but still the three original types of landscape that constituted the region could well be distinguished. The sand dunes and hills were covered by a dense chapparal of live oak (Quercus agrifolia), Ceanothus thyrsiflora, and on northern well-moistened declivities by buckeye trees (Esculus californica). In some localities a wild cherry (Prunus ilicifolia) entered this combination, but was in growth and foliage so little different from the other components that it easily escaped notice.

This whole region grew very little grass, a fern (Pteris aquilina) forming a kind of a rough and rather transparent turf. With the exception of a Scirpus, even on marshy places, no Cyperacecus plant was growing. Achillea millefolium, Baccharis, Solidago, Scrophularia and Mimulus distributed in tufts, varied the otherwise naked ground, The depressions of this formation frequently contained marshes with a shrubby vegetation of currant bushes (Ribes malvaceum) and gooseberries (Ribes californicum) and a herbaceous vegetation of Helenium, Baccharis and Mimulus.

This character of vegetation reached, almost without modification, up to the Mission Dolores, where grassy plains and hills, containing arborescent growths only in their ravines, took its place. A belt of the same formation extended from North Beach to the Presidio, interrupted here and there by the Artemisia and Franseria, vegetation of the moving dunes and the seashore.

The character of this open tract was in no way different from that of the common California pasturage ground when its vegetation is not yet too much interfered with. A turf, mostly of annual grasses, whose monotony relieved by frequent patches of Nemophila and Eschscholtzia, is interwoven with different species of Panicula, Orthocarpus, Castilleja and Lupinus, the latter in their arborescent species frequently forming miniature forests.

The third formation of landscape was the most characteristic, and many of the component parts of its flora have entirely disappeared from our neighborhoods; one of them, an Arenaria of singular beauty, probably is extinct, at least has not yet been found again in any other locality.

This formation occupied the southern part of the peninsula, and consisted of a large marshy plain, merging, towards the sea, into the common California marsh, full of meandering, brackish creeks, and separated on the other side from the Ceanothus and live oak and chapparal, by a densely interwoven and much varied arborescent vegetation, where the trees of the chapparal mingled with Myrica, dogwood (Cornus), honeysuckle (Lonicera), Garrya, bay tree (Oreodaphne), Photinia, etc. A corresponding herbaceous vegetation of luxuriant Megarrhiza, hemlock, Heracleum, differ