89. On the use of a Transit-Circle as a substitute for the Zenith Telescope in the determination of Latitude; by C. S. Lyman.

90. Instruments for measuring the Depth of the Ocean; by W. P. Trowbridge. 91. On the Stratigraphical Position of the Sandstone of the Connecticut Valley; by J. D. Whitney.

92. On a remarkable Vein of Gold in the bed of the Chestatee river, Georgia; by W. P. Blake.

93. The Placer Gold Mines of Georgia, and the introduction of improved methods of working them; by W. P. Blake.

94. Remarks on the Minerals and Ancient Mines of the Cherokee Valley River, North Carolina; by W. P. Blake.

95. Contribution to the History of the Laurentian Limestones; by W. E. Logan. *96. On "Anhydrous Fermentation;" by L. F. Locke.

97. On some Reactions of the Salts of Lime and Magnesia; by T. S. Hunt.

98. On the Paradox of the Coexistence of Excessive Production and Excessive Population; by Clinton Roosevelt.

99. On the Formation of Gypsum and Magnesian Rocks; by T. S. Hunt. 100. On the Origin and Formation of Silicious Rocks; by T. S. Hunt.

101. The Relations of the Upper Carboniferous Rocks of Illinois to the older members of the Palæozoic System; by J. H. McChesney.

102. Remarks on the Discovery of a Terrestrial Flora in the Mountain Limestone of Illinois; by A. H. Worthen.

103. On the Composition of Pectolite; by J. D. Whitney.

104. On Magnetizing Locomotive Wheels by Curved Helices, and the Experimental Results; by Edward W. Serrell.

105. Vital Observations and Statistics as Data for the Formation of Natural Life-Tables; by E. B. Elliott.

106. Experiments on Induction-Time in Electro-magnets in Telegraph Lines; by A. D. Bache and J. E. Hilgard.

107. On Certain Phenomena of the Great Dismal Swamp in Virginia and North Carolina; by Nathan B. Webster.

108. The Causes of Steam-boiler Explosions; by James Hyatt.

The officers of the Association for 1860 are: President, Isaac Lea, of Philadelphia; Vice President, B. A. Gould, Cambridge, Mass.; General Secretary, Joseph LeConte, of Columbia, S. C.; Treasurer, A. L. Elwyn, of Philadelphia.

The next meeting will be held at Newport, R. I., on the first of August, 1860. The warm waters of that shore will offer a rich treat to the naturalists who will unquestionably assemble at Newport in unwonted numbers.

The address of the retiring president, Prof. Alexis Caswell of Brown University, after paying a deserved tribute to the memory of deceased members, was a sketch of American progress in his favorite science of Astronomy. It will be published in the Transactions of the Association.

Among the attractions already visible for the Newport meeting will be-by appointment of the Association-a discourse by Prof. Joseph Henry, commemorative of the life and scientific labors of Dr. Robert Hare; and an address by A. D. Bache on the Gulf Stream. It is equally interesting and appropriate that the labors of his great grandson should have contributed so signally to enlarge our knowledge of this wonderful river of the sea, which Dr. Franklin was the first to bring to the general notice of the scientific world. Dr. Jos. Leidy was also requested to address the Association at Newport upon the extinct Reptilia and Mammalia of North America.

SECOND SERIES, VOL. XXVIII, No. 83.–SEPT., 1859.

2. Scientific versus Practical Instruction.-The following testimony of Liebig as to his famous school at Giessen, is worth considering in these days of schools of practical science.

The technical part of an industrial pursuit can be learned: principles alone can be taught. To learn the trade of husbandry the agriculturist must serve an apprenticeship to it; to inform his mind in the principles of the science he must frequent a school specially devoted to this object. It is impossible to combine the two; the only practicable way is to take them up successively. I formerly conducted at Giessen a school for practical chemistry, analysis, and other branches connected therewith, and thirty years' experience has taught me that nothing is to be gained by the combination of theoretical with practical instruction. It is only after having gone through a complete course of theoretical instruction in the lecture hall that the student can with advantage enter upon the practical part of chemistry. He must bring with him into the laboratory a thorough knowledge of the principles of the science, or he cannot possibly understand the practical operations. If he is ignorant of these principles, he has no business in the laboratory. In all industrial pursuits connected with the natural sciences, in fact, in all pursuits not simply dependent on manual dexterity, the development of the intellectual faculties by what may be termed school learning, constitutes the basis and chief condition of progress and of every improvement. A young man with a mind well stored with solid scientific acquirements will, without difficulty or effort, master the technical part of an industrial pursuit; whereas in general, an individual who is thoroughly master of the technical part may be altogether incapable of seizing upon any new fact that has not previously presented itself to him, or of comprehending a scientific principle and its application."-Liebig, Letters on Modern Agriculture, edited by John Blyth, M.D.

3. Dr. Newberry's late Explorations in New Mexico-he shows Marcou's so-called Jurassic to be Cretaceous.-Advices have been received from Dr. Newberry at Santa Fé, N. Mexico, as late as July 18th, in letters to Mr. Meek. Dr. N., following the Santa Fé road from Independence, Mo., to near Burlingame, Kansas, saw nothing but rocks of the upper Coal measures, but near Burlingame, on the banks of Dragon creek, he found the first Permian forms [the dip in all this region is N.W.] From Wellington to Cottonwood and Turkey creek the Permian was constantly found in the hill-tops, but the valleys were excavated down to the Carboniferous. The Permian was a light cream-colored Magnesian Limestone. From the Little Arkansas to Walnut creek the surface rocks were Red, Yellow and White Marls and Gypsum, so characteristic of the Llano Estacado and the country west of the Rio Grande. There were no fossils. These are the beds seen by Meek and Hayden and described by them as between the lower Cretaceous and the Permian in Kansas, some 35 to 40 miles farther to the northeast, and which rocks they state in their paper may be either Jurassic or Triassic-but they (like Dr. Newberry) discovered no fossils in them.

On the banks of Walnut creek, a tributary of the Arkansas—a little farther west, Dr. Newberry saw the same red or brown sandstone from which Messrs. Meek and Hayden collected the fossil leaves on Smoky Hill

river, some 40 or 50 miles farther to the northeast, and also in Nebraska at the Blackbird Hills. In this sandstone and in a gray clay beneath it, he also has found some of the same " leaves of dicotyledonous treesWillows, &c., precisely as at Smoky Hill, Blackbird Hills and in New Jersey." These leaves Dr. Newberry pronounces the same which mark the base of the Cretaceous in New Jersey, Nebraska and Kansas. These are the leaves declared by Prof. Heer and Mr. Marcou to be Miocene!

The Cretaceous beds at this point were not seen by Dr. Newberry overlying the sandstone, but on the Canadian, further southwest, as we might expect from the dip, he found this same sandstone overlaid by the same Cretaceous seen by Meek and Hayden surmounting it in Nebraska. In these Cretaceous beds,—a whitish marly limestone and shale (Nos. 2 and 3 of the Nebraska Section of Meek and Hayden, the Sandstone being No. 1.) he found Inoceramus problematicus, a well known Cretaceous species (so in England and various parts of Europe,) as well as in No. 3 of the Nebraska Section,-associated with Ammonites New-Mexicana, Gryphaa Pitcheri (G. dilatata, var. Tucumcarii of Marcou). Thus we have the same stone which Mr. Marcou and Prof. Heer would make Miocene, overlaid by beds containing not only well known and admitted Cretaceous fossils, but along with these the very Gryphaa relied upon by Mr. Marcou for the establishment of the existence of the Jurassic. So if Mr. Marcou and Prof. Heer are right, the Miocene proves to be older than the Cretaceous and the Jurassic! and the unfortunate American geologists find to their confusion that the roof of their geological edifice was constructed before the foundation was laid.

Dr. Newberry states also, "at Galisteo I found upper and lower Cretaceous rocks beautifully exposed, and in the lower Cretaceous Sandstone (Jurassic of Marcou) dicotyledonous leaves." "The [true] Jurassic may be in New Mexico," he continues, "but we have not yet detected it— Marcou's Jurassic is certainly not so."

The facts elicited by Dr. N. seem however to sustain the Trias in New Mexico. Writing from Abiquia (near Santa Fé), N. Mexico, he says: "Here in the red gypsum-bearing marls-the Gypsum formation' of Blake, and the Marl Seams' of Dr. N.'s former report he finds extensive deposits of copper-copper schists and copper conglomerate, precisely as the copper. schists of Europe." The red gypsum-bearing rocks here referred to as embracing the copper schists are probably the same seen by Meek and Hayden in Kansas between the Permian and the Lower Cretaceous, and which they were disposed to refer to the Jurassic or Triassic.

The most important evidence however, of the age of these deposits, is in the occurrence in them of Cycadaceous plants-Zamites, Pterophyllum, &c., which are, in Dr. N.'s opinion, similar to those of the Keuper (Upper Trias) of Europe; but he reserves a positive assertion on this point until he can compare his New-Mexican forms more carefully with the European species than is possible in the field.

Dr. Newberry's route lay from Abiquia, the day after his latest date (July 18th) towards the country near the mouths of the San Juan, which, from all accounts, is a paradise for the geologist, but very much the reverse for other people. He hopes to exhibit his interesting collections to his geological friends in the United States by the end of October.

4. Meteor of August 11, 1859.—On the morning of the 11th of August, at 7 o'clock and 20 minutes, or thereabouts, thermometer 73° F., air still and without clouds, two violent and successive explosions or reports (one witness, Mrs. Ball, says there were three,) were heard over a district of country, extending in an east and west line, from Blandford, in Hampden county, Massachusetts, to some ten miles west of the cities of Troy and Albany on the Hudson-a distance of about 100 miles;-and in a north and south line from Bennington, Vt., to Columbia Co., N. Y., a distance of about 80 miles.* The noise, which has been compared by some, to two successive, sharp and heavy peals of thunder, and by others, to the report occasioned by the explosion of a steam-boiler, or powder-mill, was accompanied by very distinct and prolonged echoes, and appears to have been noticed most sensible, and to nearly an equal degree, in Troy, Greenbush, Lansingburg, Waterford, Grafton, and New Lebanon, in N. Y., at Bennington in Vermont, and in the vicinity of Pittsfield, Mass. At Troy, the concussion was so great that houses were shaken, and people walking in the streets were conscious of a vibration of the earth. At Schaghticoke, N. Y., and Bennington, Vt., where powder-mills are in operation, the report was referred by the citizens to explosions at the works. At Schaghticoke, when the managers of the powder-works ascertained that no explosion of mills had taken place either in their own town or in Bennington, they at once concluded that a train of waggons despatched from their works for Troy, a few hours before, with powder had been blown up, and messengers were sent with haste in pursuit of them. At Eagle Bridge, on the Troy and Bennington railroad, the concussion was forcible enough to jar the windows and shake the seats in a train of cars in motion. At Schodack, on the Springfield and Albany railroad, men who were at work in the fields heard the report and felt the shock with great distinctness, and at Greenbush, a large number of people rushed to the docks, expecting that a steamboat had burst its boiler.

As to the cause of the phenomenon ;—a great abundance of concurrent testimony, seems to prove, that it was due to the explosion of an immense meteor at a considerable distance above the surface of the earth. This evidence, so far as we have been able to collect it is, as follows:

John P. Ball, County Clerk of Rensselaer Co., N. Y., in a letter to the editor of the Troy Times, states: "that as he was standing in his dooryard, just after breakfast, he observed a bright body in the air, descending very rapidly to the ground in a northwesterly direction. When apparently about a half a mile above the earth, it disappeared, and in a moment or more he heard the explosion. It was very loud and resembled thunder. He had previously called his family to view the meteor, and they all observed the light and heard the explosion. Mrs. Ball insists that there were three separate explosions-one much louder than the others and in support of her statement, Mr. B. says he saw three distinct clouds of smoke in the track of the meteor, which appeared to be a mile or more apart. The smoke was visible for some time, but was finally lost to sight. The meteor appeared to be at a distance of about twenty miles from Mr. Ball's residence."

*The limits, as here given, are based upon positive information; they may, however, possibly have been much more extensive.

Ezra Turner and son, of North Schaghticoke, N. Y., three miles north of Mr. Ball's residence in Grafton, observed the meteor distinctly, and heard the explosion.

At New Lebanon, N. Y., it was seen by two members of the Shaker community to pass over their town in the direction of Troy, and was apparently as large as a "flour barrel."

At Hoossic, N. Y., it was also observed, together with the cloud of smoke that followed the explosion. A lad living in the easterly limits of the city of Troy, N. Y., saw a ball of fire in the air, and called his family to look at it. As he did so the extraordinary report was heard, and those who looked in the direction he indicated, saw a small but dense cloud of smoke.

Under date of Aug. 13th, 1859, J. R. Simmons of Berlin, N. Y., writes to the editor of the Troy Whig, as follows:-"I was standing in front of my house on Thursday morning, the 11th inst., at 7 o'clock and 20 minutes, there being a cloudless sky or very nearly so,-when my attention was suddenly attracted upwards. I saw a meteor of gigantic size, passing between the perpendicular and the altitude of 65°, towards the southwest, in a horizontal line, with great velocity, remaining in sight several seconds, and leaving trails of smoke at intervals. The color was red, like lights thrown from a roman candle, and had connected with it all the rainbow hues. While it was passing in sight. I remarked to the Rev. J. D. Rogers and my family, 'there's a rocket;' they did not get to the door before it had passed out of sight, leaving nothing but the trails of smoke for them to see. While we were looking at these, I remarked to Mr. R., that I had never seen a meteor previous to this, without hearing sound produced like a fireball in its flight through the air, or like the report of a fowling gun when discharged. After the lapse of five minutes. we all heard the [qu. three? Eds.] heavy peals, more terrible than thunder, jarring the earth as well as the atmosphere. I have heard so many conjectures in relation to what produced the terrific report, and most of them so remote from the real cause, that I have given you a correct description of the whole scene that has caused so many remarks."

At Livingston, Columbia Co., N. Y., the meteor was observed in the north, "with strips of apparent smoke, and a long rumbling sound."

Under date of August 18th, 1859, Emory F. Strong of South Manchester, Connecticut, writes to the editors of the Hartford Courant as follows:-" About twenty minutes before eight o'clock on the morning of the 11th, I was standing with a friend in a position facing the northern horizon, when our attention was attracted by an unusual appearance in the heavens—a luminous body, equal to the sun in brightness, was seen about ten degrees west of the meridian, and passing rapidly in a westerly direction; when within apparently twenty degrees of the horizon it disappeared for an instant and then on reappearing seemed to explode. Its last appearance was not unlike that of a large sky-rocket in the act of explosion. We listened for the report but heard none. The sun was shining brightly at the time, which would have rendered the phenomenon invisible to all except those whose attention for the moment happened to be directed to that particular portion of the heavens."

A correspondent of the N. Y. Evening Post, writing from New Lebanon, N. Y., gives the following account of this phenomenon as observed