En janvier 1894, le préfet de Constantine approuve une convention régulièrement passée entre l'administration et la commune mixte de Morrott et M. Barbontré pour l'exploitation des phosphates de Tabegra; en octobre 1895 M. Leygues, ministre de l'Intérieur, révoque cette même concession. Les trois concessionnaires évincés se sont pourvus devant le Conseil d'État; ils ont gagné leur procès et obtenu la condamnation de l'État. Mais est-il possible de rester indifférent devant le mal fait par les ministres qui ont prononcé ces annulations illégales ? Ainsi, des entreprises intéressantes ont été suspendues, des initiatives qu'il eût fallu encourager ont été paralysées, les capitaux, déjà timides, se sont cachés ; enfin, l'on a pu dire que l'Etat n'était pas 'honnête homme.'" In fact, the disclosures made by M. Vignon show, conclusively and emphatically, how the French colonial empire has been continuously and often nefariously misgoverned, so that it has never had a fair chance of making progress. The remedy proposed by the author, we are glad to observe, is to be found in two measures, one the abolition of the present baleful system of oppressive customs duties, or, in other words, "free trade," and the other in the adoption of the English methods of developing a colony. We on this side of the channel may very sincerely hope that M. Vignon's wise views may take root and speedily bear fruit in France, but we cannot help sharing his misgivings on the subject.

The North-American Indians of To-day. By GEORGE BIRD GRINNELL, Ph.D. London: C. Arthur Pearson, Limited, 1900. Price £1, 1s.

In this handsome and splendidly illustrated volume Dr. Grinnell endeavours to give an answer to the question of the North-American Indians of to-day—“ what are their numbers? where do they live? how do they subsist? are they becoming civilised, educated, learning the white man's ways?" Undoubtedly, the history of the treatment of its Indian subjects by the Government of the United States is painful reading, and failure seems to have followed nearly every effort to improve, or even to preserve, without diminution of numbers, the Indians of North America. The causes of the failure are very clearly indicated by Dr. Grinnell, and his observations and suggestions as to the choice and qualifications of agents, the period of their tenure of office, the supervision to be exercised over them, the limitations to be put to their authority and the like are very well worthy of the careful consideration of the Indian bureau at Washington. Besides more care in the selection and supervision of their agents, it is absolutely necessary that the Government should compel a better observance of the liquor laws, and insist on good faith and common honesty being enforced in business transactions between the red man and the white. The system of education now on trial should be thoroughly overhauled and remodelled, and all attempts to force on the Indian tribes western methods of cultivation, stock-breeding, and land-tenures should be abandoned in favour of simpler methods, more in consonance with Indian habits and experience. Major Powell has already made some progress in the study of the ethnography of these interesting races, of whom it appears that the linguistic families now number fiftynine, and represent over eight hundred tribes. Dr. Grinnell's examples of Indian traditions and folklore are very interesting; but to most readers the great attraction of the book will be the illustrations of typical living Indians by Mr. Rinehart of Omaha, which cannot be too highly praised.

A History of Rhodesia. By HoWARD HENSMAN.

Edinburgh and London :

William Blackwood and Sons, 1900. Price 68. The history of Rhodesia, according to Mr. Hensman, is a short one, as it may be said to begin with the granting of the charter to the British South African

Company in 1889, and previous to then, Rhodesia was only a happy huntingground for sportsmen and explorers. But we may still hope that the "lost cities of Mashonaland" will yield up materials from which it may be possible to elucidate and construct the history of former races and civilisations, whose existence for prolonged periods is clearly proved by the extraordinary ruins and remains which are found here and there in the country. Owing to a variety of causes, nothing or practically nothing has been done as yet in the way of scientific exploration or excavation. Any efforts in the latter direction that have been made seem to have had for their primary object the discovery of gold, and the absence of peace and population fully accounts for so little having been done to clear up what is certainly one of the most interesting problems in South Africa. Mr. Hensman is, of course, an enthusiastic admirer of Mr. Cecil Rhodes, and a defender (though in qualified terms) of Dr. Jameson. He gives us a graphic description of the initial difficulties of founding the colony, and shows all the skill and versatility of a war-correspondent in his account of the Matabele war and the suppression of the Matabele rebellion. It seems impossible to write a book on South Africa nowadays without an account of the Jameson raid, so we have a chapter on it, and Mr. Hensman adds to the history of Rhodesia sketches of the sieges of Kimberley and Mafeking. In brief, the book seems to have been hastily compiled to catch the present khaki humour of the public. The style is easy and attractive, and likely to be approved by many readers.

Traité de Géologie. Par A. DE LAPPARENT. 4me Édit. Paris: Masson et Cie., 1900. Pp. 1912 (in three divisions).

Professor de Lapparent has taken the opportunity afforded by the appearance of this new edition partly to recast his work and to add considerably to its bulk. When the Traité made its first appearance, eighteen years ago, the only important text-books of geology within the reach of French students were translations of English and German works. De Lapparent's book was warmly welcomed, and in each subsequent edition the author has so improved his work that not only has it maintained its place in France as the standard text-book, but it has become increasingly valuable as a work of reference to the geologists of other countries. On comparing the present with the preceding edition, we find that the author has done all he could to present his readers with the very latest data, and to put before them the general results of the various important investigations and discussions which have of late years interested geologists. In particular, we note that he has entirely recast his description of the geological systems, and has so arranged his matter that this portion of the work acquires enhanced importance to geographers, who are interested in the question of the evolution of lands and seas. To illustrate the palaeogeography referred to, a large number of charts of Europe and of France, showing the distribution of the ancient seas, have been inserted in the text. The author does not pretend that these sketch charts are more than rough draughts or approximations. But he hopes, and we think rightly, that they will lighten the task of students, and the observations and criticisms of competent geologists will doubtless enable him to improve them for a future edition. Of late years the writers of geological text-books have more or less diffidently touched upon the subject of geographical evolution. There is so much in the geological evidence that is still obscure and uncertain that they have hesitated to attempt graphic representations, lest the student should suppose that the restorations were more than they pretended to be. There can be no doubt, however, that one of the chief aims of geological science is to trace the development of our lands ard

seas, and that geological text-books would be less repellent and dreary had their authors the boldness of Professor de Lapparent, who has now attempted to reconstruct the successive episodes in the geographical evolution of our globe. It is interesting to remember that the earliest attempts of the kind were made by a famous French geologist, Elie de Beaumont, who thus illustrated his lectures so far back as 1836. Our knowledge of the earth's crust has enormously increased since then, as any one will realise who shall compare the restorations of palaogeography by Beudant (Cours élémentaire de Géologie, 1841) and by Vogt (Lehrbuch der Geologie und Petrefactenkunde, 1845) with the much more detailed reconstructions given in the present edition of Lapparent's Traité.

Le Transvaal et l'Angleterre en Afrique du Sud. Par GEORGES AUBERT. Paris: Ernest Flammarion. Pp. viii. + 346.

This book is for the most part a reproduction of a work which the author published some two years ago with the imprimatur and blessing of the now notorious Dr. Leyds, who wrote: "Votre livre ne manquera pas, j'en suis persuadé, d'encourager vivement l'émigration française dans notre pays et d'y fortifier ainsi l'élément français si nécessaire à notre développement économique et intellectuel." The present edition was written apparently about the end of 1899, and the author's political sagacity and foresight may be gauged by the fact that he repeatedly discusses the future of South Africa in general, and of the Transvaal in particular when the Boers have completely triumphed over the British, and in one passage he even hints at England having to pay an indemnity. On the other hand, in various passages he does admit the possibility that the Boers may get the worst of the struggle. His chapters on the previous history of South Africa and the events which led up to the present war are amusing, as they give us a fair idea of what the average French writer thinks of late events, and how far wrong he can go in his appreciation of contemporary history. The rest of the book is a sketchy account of Cape Colony, Natal, the Orange River Colony, Transvaal, etc., of no use to an English reader, who has at his hand a hundred other works much more interesting and much more trustworthy. The book has a map, indifferently accurate, as showing the status quo of two years ago, and, of course, quite useless now, and there are also some very poor illustrations.

The Ruined Cities of Ceylon. By HENRY W. CAVE, M.A., F.R.S.E. London : Sampson Low, Marston, and Co., Limited, 1900. Pp. 165. Price 12s.

To those who cannot afford to purchase the original edition of Mr. H. W. Cave's Ruined Cities of Ceylon, the publication of this second and cheaper edition will be very welcome. It contains the whole of the illustrations of the first edition, and three additional illustrations, from which the reader can carry away a fairly good idea of the condition and appearance of the ruins when Mr. Cave visited them in 1896. His descriptions are lucid and comprehensive, and he eschews the over-use of technical terms. It is evident that only a beginning has been made in the excavation of these wonderful buildings, but what has already been achieved is sufficient to encourage the Cingalese Government, which has not been badly hampered like that of the adjoining continent with plague, famine, and war, to carry on a work from which most interesting results may be confidently anticipated. Some two thousand years ago Ceylon was the headquarters of Buddhism and a flourishing commercial emporium. These ruins attest its greatness, and their exploitation is a matter of profound interest to the archeologist, antiquarian, and student of history.

MANY years ago Sir Andrew Ramsay startled geologists by his remarkable paper on the glacial origin of the Permian breccias of England. The evidence, he maintained, clearly showed that glaciers and floating ice had existed in England in late Paleozoic times. While many geologists agreed with his conclusions, others remained sceptical, and tried to explain away the evidence by various ingenious suggestions. But since the appearance of Ramsay's paper many data have been gathered in widely separated regions, which leave little or no room for doubt that a glacial period of extreme severity characterised the close of Paleozoic times. Alike in South Africa, in Central India, and in Australia, geologists have come to the same conclusion as Ramsay. The glacial origin of the Indian and Australian erratic accumulations is now generally conceded, but geologists have been somewhat sceptical as to the former occurrence of an Ice Age in Southern Africa-although it must be admitted that the evidence set forth by Dr. Sutherland, upwards of thirty years ago, seemed hardly explicable in any other way than that maintained by him. But just as in Ramsay's case so in that of Dr. Sutherland, much doubt has been expressed as to whether his interpretation could be accepted. But during the past thirty years geologists in South Africa have not been idle, and the result of their investigations goes to show that about the close of Palæozoic times an Ice Age of great severity did really supervene. In the Report of the Geological Survey of Cape Colony for 1899, we have much additional evidence described by Messrs. Rogers and Schwarz, and Professor Corstorphine presents an admirable résumé and review, which is so interesting that we cite it nearly in full. After brief reference to the Appendices, in which are contained the detailed evidence collected by the geologists, Dr. Corstorphine writes as follows:

VOL. XVII.

E

"A trip along the extreme north of the Colony seemed, from what had been previously written, to give prospect of extended and possibly new information about the 'DWYKA CONGLOMERATE,' and at the same time to afford opportunity for the investigation of the older rocks, mainly granite and different types of schists, which may, or may not, be the equivalent of the rocks on the south, for which we have adopted the name Malmesbury Beds. It was also an instruction that coal 'indications' should receive special attention, but, unfortunately, neither Mr. Rogers nor Mr. Schwarz saw anything which the most sanguine imagination could construe into an 'indication.' The present value of the survey therefore lies in the gain to our knowledge of the northern conglomerate, which since 1886 has,1 with that on the south, been termed 'Dwyka Conglomerate.'

"In the subsequent details of the Prieska survey the name Dwyka Conglomerate has not been retained, but we have for the present reverted to the older one, GLACIAL CONGLOMERATE, originally used by E. J. Dunn. This name has been adopted, not to indicate that the northern rock is something absolutely distinct and different from the southern 'Dwyka Conglomerate,' but chiefly to emphasise the main fact, and because there is, in addition, as will be seen in the sequel, an important distinction between the two, and it seems likely that later, in spite of such inconvenience as may thereby be caused, some more distinctive name than Dwyka Conglomerate must be adopted, at least for the northern outcrop. At present, however, we have no intention of seriously disturbing the accepted nomenclature, and our reluctance to apply the name Dwyka Conglomerate to the rock here considered may appear uncalled for, but the character of the rock is so different from that of the outcrops on the Dwyka river, that the adoption of another name appears desirable. It seemed better, therefore, to revert for the present to the most descriptive of the older names which may assist, and will be amply justified if it tend to, the presentation of a clear statement of the facts of the case. The following discussion of the northern conglomerate involves the southern one as well, since, in spite of the differences referred to, there can be no doubt that the two are closely related.

"The Prieska conglomerate surveyed last year was known to Wyley,2 who named it TRAP CONGLOMERATE, but did not otherwise suggest that

1 E. J. Dunn : Report on a supposed extensive Deposit of Coal underlying the Central Districts of the Colony, Cape Town, 1886.

2 Andrew Wyley: Notes of a Journey in Two Directions across the Colony. Cape Town, 1859.

"In this report Wyley describes the southern exposure of (Dwyka) conglomerate at Pienaar's Kloof, near Touws River, under the name Trap Conglomerate. He states also that he recognised the same rock at Graham's Town and the Ecca Valley, and enters into his view of the nature of the rock, and his reason for rejecting "Claystone-porphyry," the term used for the conglomerate by A. G. Bain. Further on (p. 29) he first mentions the northern conglomerate, as a "peculiar trap conglomerate," occurring apparently interstratified with the schists. Five or six miles below Hope Town, he again saw a peculiar trap (?) conglomerate forming thick horizontal beds" (p. 34). In neither of these two references does he suggest, otherwise than by the mere use of the name, which in the second instance he queried, that this northern rock is the same as that at Pienaar's Kloof.