From Scope and Arrangement of Review: "This review is confined to the technical literature of the origin, history, and foreign occurrences of saline potassium minerals, their mining, description, treatment, and physical-chemical relations. The literature on alunite, jarosite, and related minerals has also been included. The literature on potash minerals associated with the nitrate deposits and on the silicate minerals has been omitted as well as that on analytical methods, statistics, political economy, and the very large field of patent literature. The material in this review is arranged chronologically and alphabetically according to the authors within each year."

From Introduction: "The major purpose of this bulletin, as indicated in the preface by Dr. John W. Finch, Director of the Bureau of Mines, is to give a critical review of the coal-mining methods used in the principal producing countries of Europe, to describe the reasons underlying the adoption of these methods, and to contrast them with coal-mining methods employed in the United States."