In regard to the Permian discovery in Kansas, we regret to see that Prof. Swallow (doubtless inadvertently) here in an official report, uses language, which when taken in connection with the fact that he nowhere alludes to the labors of others in that region would lead some to think he had intentionally ignored the agency of any other parties in that discovery and was claiming it as wholly his own." Thus in a note at the bottom of page 42, after speaking of the discovery of Permian rocks in Kansas, he says "this discovery was first announced by myself Feb. 22, 1858. See Trans. Acad. Sci. St. Louis, vol. i."

*

We had supposed the dispute in regard to this discovery was long since amicably settled, when Prof. Swallow published in this Journal, [2], vol. xxvi, page 188, in a paper on the Kansas Permian, the statement that "it is but just to state in this connection, that, so far as I know, Mr. Meek first discovered the Permian character of the Kansas fossils, and communicated to Maj. Hawn his impression on this subject on the 3d of Sept., 1857. He also mentioned his discovery, as I am informed, to some friends at the Smithsonian Institution on the 17th of January, 1858, and communicated the same to Prof. Leidy, on the 16th of March. Maj. Hawn frankly declares that his first impressions that the rocks in question might be Permian are due to Mr. Meek." We may be mistaken; but the literal wording of Prof. Swallow's note quoted above, in connection with his silence in regard to the agency of others in this discovery, might be understood, without some explanation, as indicating an intention to claim it on the strength of the fact that his announcement, communicating the discovery to a regularly established scientific institution at an earlier date than the reading of Meek and Hayden's paper before the Albany Institute, gave him a right to claim it as entirely his own. On this ground, however, Meek and Hayden would still be in advance, for they had not only made it known verbally to friends in Washington, about the 17th of Jan., 1858, but actually had a record made of it at the Smithsonian Institution, (as all know, established for the increase and diffusion of knowledge) on the 19th of Jan., 1858. This record or memorandum, which we are permitted to give here, was written by Prof. Baird and reads as follows:

"1858, Jan. 19th, Mr. Meek and Dr. Hayden showed me a series of fossils arranged on the table of room 110, from Dr. Hayden's collections under Lieut. Warren in 1857, which they stated

*This latter date is doubtless a misprint for 16th of Jan., for the discovery was actually published on the 4th of March, 1858, by Meek and Hayden in a paper read before the Albany Institute on the 2d of March, 1858, extras of which were distributed by them two days after, and before the issue of Prof. Swallow's paper alluded to above: though Prof. Swallow had a short time previously published a note on the subject in a St. Louis newspaper. He also published another notice in this Journal, issued, if we mistake not, between 4th and 10th of March, 1858.

to represent in succession, first, Potsdam Sandstone from the Black Hills; 2d, forms indicating Permian both in Kansas and the region of the Black Hills; 3d, fossils of the Jurassic type from the region of the Black Hills; 4th, Carboniferous from the Black Hills. (Signed) S. F. BAIRD."

This memorandum is not noted in the order the fossils were arranged; the clause in regard to the Carboniferous was accidentally omitted between the Potsdam Sandstone and the Permian, and then added at the end after the Jurassic. Nor is any mention made of the fossils sent from Kansas to Mr. Meek by Mr. Hawn, nor of a small collection from the same region communicated by Dr. Cooper which were at the same time lying on the table; though both of these gentlemen received full credit for collecting and sending these fossils, in the paper published by Meek and Hayden.

It is with considerable reluctance that this subject, which we had thought entirely settled, has been touched upon here; but the facts already mentioned seemed to demand such a statement. At the same time that Meek and Hayden manifest no desire to ignore the connection of Mr. Hawn and Prof. Swallow with the Permian discovery, they have the right to expect their own agency in the matter to be acknowledged, especially in an official report on the geology of that region, treating upon this formation and speaking of the labors of others in that connection.*

In Prof. Swallow's former papers, he gives the total thickness of the Upper and Lower Permian as he understands them, at 820 feet, and in the report under review the thickness of the same beds is given as 704 feet 1 inch. This is quite as near an

* We have made some remarks in regard to the Permian discovery in this article, not with the idea of convincing any one at all familiar with the facts of the case, for several of the ablest geologists of the present time have indicated directly or indirectly their opinion on this matter, but because our silence might be taken as entire submission to the apparent disposition on the part of some geologists to ignore our agency in the development of the geology of the West. No true-minded geologist in reading Prof. Swallow's statements under his own signature as given in this article and the note by Mr. Meek appended to a paper published in the Trans. Albany Institute, March 2d, 1858, can possibly err in regard to the real discoverer of the Permian in Kansas. During the year 1857, I had the good fortune to be connected as geologist, with a U. S. exploring expedition to the Black Hills under the command of Gen. G. K. Warren, U. S. A. Among some fossils I had collected at various points in the Black Hills and along the Missouri river, were forms much like those of the Permian of Europe. Maj. Hawn and Dr. Cooper had also sent to Mr. Meek collections from Kansas. In numerous letters from Mr. Meek while I was in the West he continually impressed upon me the importance of looking out for Permian fossils. In a letter dated Oct. 20th, 1857, he said he had received "some fossils sent on by Maj. Hawn evidently either Upper Coal-measure forms or Permian, I would not be astonished if they should prove to be the latter." Again, Nov. 10th, 1857, speaking of some fossils I had sent him from near Nebraska City, "among them I think I recognized a Monotis [Pseudomonotis], a genus not known in the old world in older rocks than the Permian."

F. V. H.

agreement as could be expected in the measurement of such variable strata at different localities; yet when there is a difference of 116 feet, and the numerous subordinate beds composing the whole are stated as varying in thickness at different places from 1 to 15 feet, 4 to 12 feet, 10 to 25 feet, and so on, one would naturally suppose that the odd inch might have been dispensed with in summing up the whole, as it gives the appearance of minute exactness, manifestly unattainable in the measurement of such strata.

In regard to the beds referred with a? by Prof. Swallow and Mr. Hawn to the Trias in Kansas, we can only say that they may be Trias, Permian or even Jurassic, so far as any evidence yet obtained goes. With those gentlemen we are much inclined to believe they will be found to belong to the Trias. They are known to hold a position immediately above Permian beds and beneath the Cretaceous, while they are very similar to portions of the Trias of Europe in their lithological characters. At the same time, it is by no means demonstrated that they may not prove to belong to the Permian. Prof. Swallow, at first, referred to this horizon a trilobate exogenous leaf, a small bivalve he thought doubtfully identical with Nucula speciosa Münster, from the Muschelkalk (not a true Nucula by the way), and another shell he thought identical with Myophoria orbicularis Goldf. (sp.) As Prof. Swallow now only alludes to the supposed Nucula, and makes no mention of the Myophoria in his report, in speaking of this rock, it is probable he has found the latter to be a Schizodus or some other type from the Permian; and as the trilobate leaf is now known to be from the Cretaceous, as shown by Meek and Hayden, the paleontological evidence yet obtained of the Triassic age of these beds seems to be narrowing down to a single little bivalve, of doubtful genus. It is true Prof. Mudge thinks he has found bird tracks in a sandstone of this horizon, but as he also speaks of finding exogenous leaves in the same position, it seems probable that the tracks mentioned by him are from the sandstone belonging to the Cretaceous, in which so many leaves have been found in that region. We must therefore await further evidence before we can regard the existence of the Trias in eastern Kansas as demonstrated.

ART. IV. On the systematic value of Rhynchophorous Coleoptera: -an Abstract of a Memoir read before the National Academy of Sciences, at Washington, Jan. 24th, 1867; by JOHN L. LECONTE, M.D.

IN the empirical arrangement of the families of Coleoptera, which has resulted from the adoption of the tarsal system of division, the families contained in the great natural group of Heteromera are followed by the Curculionidæ and Scolytide, which, more or less subdivided into smaller families, have been supposed to establish a linear relation between the rostrated Heteromera (Salpingus, Rhinosimus, &c.) to the Cerambycide and Chrysomelidae, the great types of the Pseudotetramera, or Subpentamera, of various authors.

It is the object of the present investigation to determine the limits, and the relations of the first mentioned of these types, the Rhynchophora.

The inferiority of this type is manifested, not only in the larval condition by the limited number or absence of visual lenses, the want of locomotive appendages, the feeble development or entire want of antennæ, and the unchitinized epidermis; but also by the combination in the imago of characters belonging to a perfectly developed organism with others pertaining to an inferior grade in the scale of Coleoptera.

Thus, for instance, while we perceive in the other series of beetles, that the lower forms retain certain larval characters, as evidenced by the extension of the coxæ, the imperfection of the anterior coxal cavities, the softness of the integuments, and the want of centralization in the abdomen, all such degradational characters are absent in the Rhynchophora.

Other characters representing low grades in their respective series do not appear in the Rhynchophora, such as vegetative growth of the organs of sense, indicated by pectinate or flabellate antennæ, or excessive length of palpi.

On the contrary, we find in the Rhynchophora, that the integuments are perfectly chitinized: the elytra never abbreviated or wanting; the anterior coxæ are always completely enclosed; the ventral segments, usually five, never exceed six in number.

The plan of degradation, in passing from the higher to the lower forms, is by the extension of the longitudinal axis of the body, in its anterior half; this is usually most strongly manifes ted in the head, and exhibited not only by the length of the beak, but by the conformation of the lower floor of the mouth.

Commencing with those Curculionidæ (Adelognathi Lacordaire,) in which the mentum fills the gular emargination, as in the

AM. JOUR. SCI.-SECOND SERIES, VOL. XLIV, No. 130.-JULY, 1867.

higher Tenebrionidæ, we find a gradual lessening in size of the mentum, itself becoming supported upon a broad, short, gular peduncle, permitting the maxilla to become visible, (Phanerognathi, Cohort 1, Lacordaire): next the gular peduncle becomes elongated, and bilobed, receiving the mentum, now reduced to very small size, between its lobes (Phanerognathi, Cohort 11, and also Brenthidae, and Anthribide).

Having in the continuance of my work on the Classification of Coleoptera of North America, recently commenced a critical study of our Rhynchophora, I became aware of the impossibility of intercalating them between the Heteromera and Subpentamera, and am now convinced that they represent a special type, which must be isolated from all other types of Coleoptera, possessing a systematic value equal to all the others combined.

In seeking for the characters which should define this type, I observed a remarkable difference in the arrangement of the pieces of the under surface of the prothorax, heretofore overlooked, and so far as I know, confined to this particular type.

In other Coleoptera, the prosternum is either extended behind the anterior coxæ, so as to form part of the hind margin of the segment, thus coming in contact with the mesosternum, or it is cut off between the coxa, and in this case (as in many others) the coxal cavities are open behind: in the few exceptions (Derodontus, Dacoderus) in which the coxæ are contiguous and the cavities closed behind, the prosternum still extends behind the coxæ, to the hind margin of the segment, as is shown by the short sutures separating the epimera from the medial piece of the prosternum.

I have represented these modifications of form in the adjoining wood-cuts. Fig. 1, under surface of prothorax of a Carabide

(Pasimachus); the coxal cavities are closed, and the epimera and episterna well defined. Fig. 2, do. of a Scarabaeide (Lachnoster