F ‘ at ey t ' . ; ran . toe . ; 7 ; 2 fi ’ ys . i Caan) A wie : ‘ . : See Ne . Pa , * [aaa ox’ . rare . ’ cs ee a : eg - F oy . P ' ’ o's ‘ ’ ‘ ‘ one as 7 i . F . . + ‘ . F ‘ ae ‘ % : ’ 7 . ate 4 . ‘ é ste F . ° ‘ . - Re Sov 2 es “ . ’ ' - he . 7 « ae He * t 4 van : ’ can . : ' : ‘ ' ' ae, ‘ . ‘ ee i : . ‘ ‘ : . ' t : : we ‘ . we ‘ ‘ : ‘ . rig ee eke : eee, Ran sce eae + oY ut . wr tee 8 - , : 14 ae, .o4 7 4 : . . / . at ' ‘ woe kl ‘ ‘ ‘ : whew Be % 7 . ’ Seen ete useum of co bi Na (Oy leap, © SY & 1869 THE LIBRARY vi ‘i i “7 « 7 ) Ay bri 7 ny uns : hh THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL VOLUME XII, 1912 NEW YORK PUBLISHED BY THE -AMERICAN MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY 19 2 American Museum of Natural History Seventy-seventh Street and Central Park West, New York City BOARD OF TRUSTEES President ; HENRY FAIRFIELD OSBORN First Vice-President Second Vice-President CLEVELAND H. DopGg J. PreERPONT MoraGan, JR. Treasurer Secretary CHARLES LANIER ADRIAN ISELIN, JR THe Mayor or THE City or New YorxK THE COMPTROLLER OF THE CiTy or New York THE PRESIDENT OF THE DEPARTMENT OF PARKS ALBERT S. BICKMORE A. D. JuILurarp GEORGE S. BowpoIn Seta Low JoserpH H. CHoatTEe OapEN MILs Tuomas DrWiTT CuYLerR J. PrzerPont MorGan JaMES DovuGuas Percy R. PyNnE Mapison GRANT WILLIAM ROCKEFELLER Anson W. Harp JoHn B. Trevor ARTHUR CURTISS JAMES Fretrx M. WarsurG WALTER B. JAMES GrorGE W. WICKERSHAM EXECUTIVE OFFICERS Director Assistant Secretary FrepErRiIc A. Lucas GrorGeE H. SHERWOOD Assistant Treasurer THE UNITED States Trust Company or NEw YORE Tue MUSEUM I8 OPEN FREE TO THE PUBLIC ON EvERY Day IN THE YEAR. Tue AMERICAN MusEuM oF NATURAL HIsTorRy was established in 1869 to promote the Natural Sciences and to diffuse a general knowledge of them among the people, and it is in cordial codéperation with all similar institutions throughout the world. The Museum authorities are de pendent upon private subscriptions and the dues from members for procuring needed additions to the collections and for carrying on explorations in America and other parts of the world. The membership fees are, ATITHTA le WECHTDEIS fares eisteicesiedelens tous: « $ 10 GHOWS seicinieyeetsrs Satis Sted os erate $ 500 Sustaining Members (Annual)..... 25 PA Grn, Ssierersccdee oss) Ssten soca ve ee ene 1000 Life Members.......... Baie 100 Associate Benefactors........... 10,000 Benefactors (gift or bequest) $50,000 Tue Museum LisraRY contains more than 60,000 volumes with a good working collection of publications issued by scientific institutions and societies in this country and abroad. The library is open to the public for reference daily — Sundays and holidays excepted — from 9 a. m. to 5 Pp. m. Tue Museum PUBLICATIONS are issued in six series: American Museum Journal, Annual Report, Anthropological Papers, Bulletin, Guide Leaflets and Memoirs. Information concerning their sale may be obtained at the Museum library. GuIpEs FoR Srupy or ExuIsiTs are provided on request by the department of public education. Teachers wishing to bring classes should write or telephone the department for an appointment, specifying the collection to be studied. Lectures to classes may also be arranged for. In all cases the best results are obtained with small groups of children. WoORKROOMS AND STORAGE COLLECTIONS may be visited by persons presenting membership tickets. The storage collections are open to all persons desiring to examine specimens for special study. Applications should be made at the information desk. Tue Mitia RESTAURANT in the east basement is reached by the elevator and is open from 12 to 5 on all days except Sundays. Afternoon Tea is served from 2 to 5. The Mitla room is of unusual interest as an exhibition hall being an exact reproduction of temple ruins at Mitla, Mexico. ILLUSTRATIONS Alien! Dr. J.°A., 2 Alligator gar, Mounted skin of, 174 Altamira cavern, 278, 287; paintings in, 291 Amundsen, Capt. Roald, 275 Anderson, Rudolph M., 274 Arctic expedition near Kendall River, 8 Arctic wilderness, Scanning horizon in, 163 Barren Ground inland from Cape Parry, 204 Batian, Mount Kenia’s highest pinnacle, 57 Beaver in New York Zo6logical Park, 146 Beaver lodge, Red Deer River, 147 Betta pugnaz, 23 Bigtrees, 228-235 Boa constrictor swallowing rabbit, 113 Borup, George, 85, 154 Buffalo chase (Sioux Indians) 93 Bushmaster skull, 114 Butterfly group, 106 Calaveras Grove, 233 Camp oil stove, Arctic expedition, 85 Cape Thomas Hubbard, 160 Carrel, Dr. Alexis, 278 Cartailhac, Prof. Emile, 282, 283 Casts, Duplicate life, 26, 27, 29 Catfish (Macrones), 23 Catlin paintings, 89, 90, 91, 92, 93 Cave in Mexican mine, 218 Cave paintings, Reproductions, 278, 288, 290, 291, 292, 293, 294 Chimeroid, Model of Japanese, 173 Chinese ancient bronzes, 136; cloisonné, 137; masks, 135 Cicada group, 187, 189; broods, distribution, 188 Cogul, Paintings from Cavern of, 293 Coppermine River, Mud Cliff along, 12 Coronation Gulf Deserted village, Start of expedition from, 196 Coronation Gulf Island, 12 Cro-Magnon hamlet (Dordogne) 284 Crow Indian clown, 74 Cryptobranchus group, 310, 312, 313 198; Dog feast (Sioux Indians) 89 Dogs, Eskimo, 168; with sledge, 86 . Dolphin and Union Strait, Spring village, 198; winter village, 11 Dominica, Roseau Gorge, 70 Edentates, Pedigree of, 300; Skulls of, 302 Elephant country, Typical, 45, 46 Elephant cows and calves resting in forest, 52 Elephant herd, Devastation from, 60; facing to charge, 51 Elephant pit, 61, 62 Elephants, 42, 44, 45, 46, 47, 49, 50, 51, 52, 60, 99 Eskimo, 4, 7, 8, 11, 161, 200, 201, 202, 203 Eskimo snow house, 6, 10 Fish mount, 175, 176 Flamingos, 305, 306, 307, 308 Font-de-Gaume cavern, 282; Entrance to, 285; Paintings from, 288, 293 Four-toed horse skeleton, 186 Foxes, 14, 124 Fur seals, 130, 131, 132, 133 Ghost-fish, Model of Japanese, 173 Giant forest pigs, 242 Giraffe heads, 96, 97 Glyptodont carapace, 178, 179 Hagfish (Homea stouti) 173 Hannington, Lake, 304, 308 Harpoon gun, 212 Hartebeest head, 98 Horton River, Summer hunting lodge, 206 Human femur, Locality where found, 183, 184 Icebergs, 162, 163, 169 Ice pit with water-worn boulders 184, Kayak, 12 Kitovi Rookery, St. Paul Island, 132 Korean picking azaleas, 267; praying at shrine, 266 Korean expedition leaving Chon-Chin, 259; traveling by bull-cart, 262 Korean gun-bearer, 267 Korean Valley, 263 La Madeleine, Cliff ruins, 286 Larch forest, Korea, 265 La Vézére, Dordogne, 280 Le Chaffaud, Horses from, 290 Le Portel cavern, 283 Les Combarelles cavern, Mammoth from, 290 Lorthet, Engraving from cavern of, 294 Lunegfish, Living, 226, 251: cocoon of, 252 MacCurdy, Prof. George G., 282 MacMillan, Donald B., 85 159, 276 Maps: Crocker Land expedition, 84 Korean expedition, Itinerary of, 260 Stef4nsson-Anderson Arctic expedition, 5, 198 Western Colombia, 214 Mariposa Grove, 232 Masks used in mystery plays, Pekin, 135 Mexican burros, 180 Mexican fields, Cultivation of, 180 Miller, Leo E., 216 lv ; INDEX Molds, Glue, 27, 28 Monkey, “J. T. Junior,’’ 59 Mount Elgon, Forests of, 54; plateau near, 50 Mount Kenia 57, 58-59; Bamboo jungle, 55 Musk ox, 167 Niaux cavern, Entrance to, 282 North Polar regions, 166 Ophiocephalus, 23 Orizaba Bird group, 82, 102, 103, 104, 105 Osprey nests, 115 Paddlefish, Model of Chinese, 174 Peary, Admiral R. E., 122 Pelagic sealing, 134 Penguins, Antarctic regions, 170 Pleistocene gravel beds, 179 Polovina rookery, St. Paul Island, 130 Poplar grove cut down by beavers, 145 Porcupine, Albino, 148 Ptarmigan, In pursuit of, 196 Python skull, 114 Rhinoceros heads, 94, 95 Rock-shelters, 64, 65 Samcheyong River, 264 Sea lions, Young Steller’s, 133 Sea worm group, 244, 247; Collecting for, 245; detail of, 248; model of, 248 Seedlings, Bigtree, 234 Seismograph, Mainka, 296, 299; record, 298 Serape, Mexican, 32, 34 ‘*Shovel-pit’’ at Ely, Nevada, 110-111 Sioux dress, 67 Slime-eel (Homea stouti) 173 Sled, Coronation Gulf, 10 Smoking the Shield (Catlin Painting) 92 Snake group, 30, 31 Soil, Cross section of layers, 183 Soundings, Deep sea, 168 South Polar regions, 167 Spoonbill sturgeon group, 172 Stefansson, Vilhjdlmur, 194, 196 Stone house, Simpson Bay, 197 Sun dance ritual, 25 Sun, Last view of in Arctics, 164 Tahiti natives, 141, 142, 143, 144 Termite nest, 72 Tide-pool, Nahant, 668 Titanothere skull, 15; modeling, 16 Toucan at home, 82 Tumen River, 263 Turtle hunt by torchlight, 90 Uganda, In the forests of, 42 Vries, Prof. Hugo de, 277 War dance, Tapuya, 91 Water ‘‘butterfly’’ (Pantodon) 23 Whales, California gray, 208, 210; finback} 209; humpback, 211; killer, 212 Whaling Station, Ulsan, Korea, 207 Wild boar group, 100, 101 Wild boar swallowed by python, 112 Yalu River, Raft on, 264 INDEX Capitals Indicate the Name of a Contributor Accessions: Anthropology, 80, 270, 271, 272 Geology, 117, 151, 191, 257-8, 272 Herpetology, 112, 119 Ichthyology, 118 Invertebrate Paleontology, 118 Invertebrate Zodlogy, 118 Library, 222 Mammalogy and Ornithology, 38, 78, 151, 191, 224, 269, 318 Mineralogy, 38, 117, 152, 269 Public Education, 271 Vertebrate Paleontology, 76 African Traveler’s Note, 73 AxeLey, Cart FE. Elephant-hunting in Equatorial Africa, 43-62; Flamingos of Lake Hannington, 305-308 Akeley, Carl E., 76, 191, 318 Auten, J. A. Zodlogy of the Stefansson- Anderson Arctic expedition, 237 Allen, J. A., 18-19, 296, 318 Amundsen, Roald, 275, 317 Anderson, R. M., 223, 238-241, 272, 274 Anprews, R. C. Expedition in Korea, 207-213; Exploration of Northeastern Korea, 259-267 Andrews, R. C., 150, 319 Annulate Group, 118 Annual Report, 190 Ant Group, 320 Applied Chemistry, Congress of, 225 Appointments, 36, 38, 77, 119, 223, 271 Archeological discoveries, 192 Arctic and Antarctic Compared, 166-170 Art of the Cave Man, 289-295 Art, Story of Decorative, 66-67 Eighth International Bacteria cultures, 119, 319; models of, 36 Beaver, Protection of, 145-147 Beebe, C. William, 76 Bernheimer, Charles L., 223 INDEX Vv BEUTENMULLER, WILLIAM, Expedition to the Black Mountains, 69-70 Bigtrees, Present Condition of California, 227-236 Bliss, Mrs. W. H., 270 Black Mountains, Expedition to the, 69-70 Borup, George, 36, 155-158 Brown, Barnum, Discovery in the Fossil Fields of Mexico, 177-180; Where the Beaver is Protected, 145-147 Burroughs, John, 150 Butterfly migration, 107-108 Canfield, F. A., 152 Carrel, Alexis, 272, 278 Catlin Paintings, 89-93 Cave Man, Art of the, 289-295 Cave Material from a Mexican Mine, 218 CuHarpman, F. M. Field Work in Colombia, 215-217 Chapman, F. M., 223 Chimayo Blankets, 33-34 Chinese Collections in Historical 135-138 Churchman, Dr. John W., 119 Colombia, Field Work in, 215-217 Congo Expedition, 222 Contents, Table of, 1, 41, 81, 121, 153, 193, 2205 2h Copper Queen Mine, 40 Crampton, H. E. Field Work in Dominica, 71; Songs of Tahiti, 141-144 Crimmins, John D., 319 Crocker Land Expedition, 83-88, 150, 159- 163, 309 Crow Indian Clowns, 74 Light, Darwin hal!, 37, 38, 39, 117, 245-250, 320 Davis, W. T. Osprey Nests, 115 Dean, Basnurorp, Exhibition of Fishes, 171-177; Exhibition of the New York Aquarium Society, 21-23; Fish Out of Water, 251-253 Dean, Bashford, 192 Deutsches Museum, 190 Dickerson, M. C. Note on Poisonous Snakes, 30-31; Note on the Giant Sala- mander Group, 311-313; Python from the Philippines, 112-114 Dickerson, M. C., 223 Dinosaurs, New, 219 Dominica, Field Work in, 71 _ Eagle, Clarence H., 191 Early Man in America, 181-185 Edentates, Ancestry of, 301-303 Education, Department of, 318 Elephant-hunting, 43-62 Eskimo and Civilization, 195-203 Ethnology, Convergent Evolution in, 139- 140 Exchanges, 118, 152, 320 Exhibits, 37, 39, 78, 118, 151, 171-6, 191, 192, 223, 268, 272 Expeditions: Africa, 224; Arctic, 3-13, 195-203, 205-206, 223, 237, 272, 318; Arizona, 223; Black Mountains, 69-70: Colombia, 38, 79, 151, 215-217, 223, 230; Congo, 222; Crocker Land, 83-88, 150, 159-163, 309; Dominica, 71; Florida. 79. 152; Jamaica. 72; James Bay, 77; Korea, 150, 152, 207-213, 259-267, Montana, 224; North Dakota, 224; South Georgia Islands, 224. South- west, 38, 39, 192, 317; Wisconsin, 224 Fish Models, 192 Fish out of Water, 251—253 Fishes, Exhibition of, 171-177 Flamingos of Lake Hannington, 305-308 Floyd, William, 192 Forestry hall, 37, 227 Forestry, Status of, 125-127 Fossil Fields of Mexico, 177—180 Four-toed Horse, Skeleton of, 37, 186 Fur Seal, 131-134 Geographical Exploration and the Museum, 164-165 Giant Salamander Group, 311-313 Gibson, Langdon, 269 Gifts, to the Museum, 38, 76, 78, 112: 117, 118, Lol 191, 222, 224 269, 270; 271. 318, 319, 320 Glacial grooves, 151 Glyptodont Discoveries, 177—180 Goddard, P. E., 38 GRANGER, WALTER, Europe, 219-220 Gratacap, L. P. ‘‘Shovel-pit’’ Nevada, 109-111 Grecory, H. E. George Borup, 158 Grecory, W. K. New Restoration of a Titanothere, 15-17 GrossBEck, J. A. Seventeen-year Locust Group, 187-189 Grossbeck, J. A., 118 Groups, 36, 38, 117, 118, 150, 187-188, 245, 311-317, 320 Groups, Three New, 101-105 People’s Museum of at Ely, Hard, Anson W., 222 Hard Collection of Saltillo and Chimayo Blankets, 33-34 Herrick, W. P. Shell and Pearl Fishing on the Mississippi, 19-21 Hoerschelmann, Dr. Werner von, 78 Holmes, W. H., 37 Hood, I. R.; 38 Horse, Evolution of, 37; Przewalsky, 76 Hovey, E. O. Cave Material from a Mexican Mine, 218; George Borup, 156-157; In Search of Crocker Land, 85-88; New Accessions of Meteorites, 257-258; Seismograph at the Museum, 297-299 Hovey, E. O., 222 Hrdlicka, Ales, 271 Huxley, Julian S., 271 Indian clown, 74; tipi, 78 vi INDEX Insects, Importance of, 253-254 International Congress of Hygiene Demography, 37, 119, 224 Isthmus of Panama, Model of, 272 and Jamaica, Collecing in, 72 Jesup, Morris K., Bas-relief of, 117 Jesup, Mrs. Morris K., 318 Kahn Foundation, 272 Kerr, Mrs. Elizabeth, 224 Klein, Alfred J., 191 Kleinschmidt, Frank E., 151 Knowlton, J. G., 270 Korea, Expedition in, 207-213; of Northeastern, 259-267 Exploration Laurer, Bertuoup, Chinese Collections in Historical Light, 135-138 Lectures, 40. 80, 119, 120, 151, 152, 270, 271, 317, 318 LENG, Cuarutes E. Codperation with New York Entomological Society, 314-316 Leng, Charles E., 118, 224 Library, 76, 222, 223 Life Casts, Museum’s Collection of 26—29 Litcurietp, E. H. Rhinoceros-hunting, 94-99 Locust, Seventeen-year, 150 Lowir, R. H. Convergent Evolution in Ethnology, 139-140; Crow Indian Clowns, 74 Lowie, R. H., 39, 7+, 224 Lucas, F. A. Fur Seal, 131-134; Giant Forest Pig, 243-244; Three New Groups, 101—105 Lueas, F. A., 35, 222 Lungfish, 251-253 Lutz, F. E. Do Butterflies Migrate? 107— 108; Importance of Insects, 253-254 Lutz, F. E., 192 MacCurdy, George G., 36, 221, 222 MacMillan, D. B., 276, 309 Man, Ancestry of, 255-256 Marine Habitat Group, 245-250 MatrHew, W. D. Ancestry of Man, 255- 256; Ancestry of the Edentates, 301— 303; Four-toed Horse Skeleton, 186; New Dinosaurs for the American Mu- seum, 219 Mathewson, Edward Payson, 119 Mead, Charles W., 77 Members, 35, 75, 116, 118, 149, 189, 221, 268, 270, 317 Meteorites, 191, 257-258 Miner, R. W. New Exhibit in the Darwin Hall, 245-250; Tide-pools of Nahant, 69 Morgan Collection, 269 Morgan, J. Pierpont, 38, 117, 222, 269 Mummy, 320 Murphy, Robert C., 224 Museum, New Southeast Wing of, 149 Museum News Notes, 35-40, 75-80, 116- 120, 149-152, 189-192, 221-224, 268- 272, 317-320 National Association of Audubon Societies, 270 Navajo Group, 319 Neanderthal Man, 271 Nelson. Nels C., 36. 317 New York Aquarium Society, 224; Exhibi- tion of, 21-23 New York Entomological Society, Codpera- tion with, 314-316 Orizaba Habitat Group, 36 Ossporn, H. F. George Borup, 155-156; Geographical Exploration, 164-165; Men of the Old Stone Age, 279-287; Preservation of the World's Animal Life, 123-124 Osborn, H. F., 221, 222, 268, 269, 270, 317, 318 Osprey Nests on Gardiner’s Island, 115 Parker, Herschel C., 319 Paul, Edward, 79 Prary, Rosert E. Arctic and Antarctic Compared, 166-170; Crocker Land Ex- ‘pedition, 159-163 Peary: A Name for History, bust, 117; celebration, 150 People’s Museum of Europe, 219-220 Peruvian Cloths, 192 Phipps, Henry, 318 Pig, Giant Forest, 243-244 Porcupine in Maine, 148 Porpoises, Bottlenose, 78 Pothole, 151 Preservation of the World’s Animal Life, 128-129; 123-124 Prics, O. W. Status of Forestry in the United States, 125-127 Publications, 77, 223, 320 Public Health Models, 224 Python from the Philippines, 112-114 Quotations from an Explorer’s Letters, 3-13 Radiolarian Models, 191 Rainey, Paul, 119 Rainsford, W. S., 73, 224 Rattlesnake Group, 78 Reading Room, 76 Reeds, Chester A., 223 Reese, Albert M., 119 Rhinoceros-hunting, 94-99 Richardson, W. B., 224 Rock-shelters, Indian, 63-65 Rock Tide-pools of Nahant, 69 Saltillo and Chimayo Blankets, 33-34 Sapir, Edward, 79 Scurasiscu, Max. 63-65 Schrabisch, Max, 152, 192 Seismograph at the Museum, 297—299 Indian Rock-shelters, INDEX vil Seventeen-year Locust Group, 187-189 Shell and Pearl Fishing, 19-21 Shipping Room, 80 ‘*Shovel-pit’’ at Ely, Nevada, 109-111 Skinner, Alanson, 177, 224, 271, 319 Smith, Harlan J., 119 Snakes, Note on Poisonous, 30-31 Society of American Bacteriologists, 76, 319 Songs of Tahiti, 141-144 Spinden, Herbert J., 192, 224 Stapleton, D. C., 271 Sreransson, V. The Eskimo and Civiliza- tion, 195-203 Stefansson, V., 268, 318 Stefansson-Anderson Arctic Expedition, 3— 13, 195-203, 205, 206, 223, 237, 272, 318 Stone Age, Men of the Old, 278-287 Supwortnu, G. B. Present Condition of the California Bigtrees, 227-236 Sun Dance Medicine Bundle, 24—25 Tahiti, Models of, 39; Songs of, 141-144 Teachers’ Day, 268 ; Titanothere, New Restoration of a, 15-17 Torre, Carlos de la, 271 Trazivuk, Marcos J., 320 Tree-hoppers, 80 U.S. Geological Survey, 39 Vives, Gaston J., 320 Vouk, Ernest. Early Man in 181-185 Vries, Hugo de, 277, 318 America, Wanamaker, Rodman, 271 Warfield, William, 319 Whales, 150, 207-213, 319 Winslow, C-E. A., 37, 76, 319 Wissuer, Cuark. Art of the Cave Man, 289-295; Catlin Paintings, 89-93; Ste- fansson’s Discoveries, 205-206; Story of Decorative Art, 66-67; Sun Dance Medicine Bundle, 24—25 Wissler, Clark, 223 Scientific Staff DIRECTOR FreperRIc A. Lucas, Se.D. GEOLOGY AND INVERTEBRATE PALHONTOLOGY Epmunp Otis Hovny, Ph.D., Curator CuestTer A. Rreps, Ph.D., Assistant Curator MINERALOGY L. P. Graracap, A.M., Curator Grorce F. Kunz, Ph.D., Honorary Curator of Gems INVERTEBRATE ZOOLOGY Henry E. Crampton, Ph.D., Curator Roy W. Miner, A.B., Assistant Curator Frank EK. Lutz, Ph.D., Assistant Curator L. P. Graracap, A.M., Curator of Mollusca Joun A. GrossBEck, Assistant Wituram Morton WHEELER, Ph.D., Honorary Curator of Social Insects ALEXANDER PETRUNKEVITCH, Ph.D., Honorary Curator of Arachnida Aaron L. TREADWELL, Ph.D., Honorary Curator of Annulata CuaruLes W. Lene, B.S., Honorary Curator of Coleoptera ICHTHYOLOGY AND HERPETOLOGY BasHrorp Dian, Ph.D., Curator Louis Hussaxor, Ph.D., Associate Curator of Fishes Joun T. Nicuots, A.B., Assistant Curator of Recent Fishes Mary Cyntuta Dickerson, B.S., Assistant Curator of Herpetology MAMMALOGY AND ORNITHOLOGY J. A. AtLeNn, Ph.D., Curator Frank M. CuHapman, Curator of Ornithology Roy C. Anprews, A.B., Assistant Curator of Mammalogy W. DEW. Miter, Assistant Curator of Ornithology VERTEBRATE PALEONTOLOGY Henry FarrFigeELD Ossorn, Sc.D., LL.D., D.Sec., Curator meritus W. D. Marruew, Ph.D., Curator Water GRANGER, Associate Curator of Fossil Mammals Barnum Brown, A.B., Associate Curator of Fossil Reptiles Wiui1am K. Grecory, Ph.D., Assistant Curator ANTHROPOLOGY Cuark Wisstmr, Ph.D., Curator Puiny E. Gopparp, Ph.D., Associate Curator Rosert H. Lowin, Ph.D., Assistant Curator Herbert J. SprinDEN, Ph.D., Assistant Curator Nets C. Netson, M. I.., Assistant Curator Cuarues W. Meap, Assistant Curator ALANSON SKINNER, Assistant Curator Harvan I. Sirs, Honorary Curator of Archxology ANATOMY AND PHYSIOLOGY Ratew W. Tower, Ph.D., Curator PUBLIC HEALTH Cuarurs-Epwarp Amory Winstow, M.S., Curator Joun Henry O’Neitt, 8.B., Assistant WOODS AND FORESTRY Mary Cyntura Dickerson, B.S., Curator BOOKS AND PUBLICATIONS Rautew W. Tower, Ph.D., Curator Ipa Ricaarpson Hoop, A.B., Assistant Librarian PUBLIC EDUCATION Avpert 8. Bickmore, Ph.D., LL.D., Curator Emeritus Gerorce H. SuHprwoop, A.M., Curator Aenes L. Rorsuer, Assistant, THE AMERICAN SIUSEUM JOURNAL RESTORATION OF A TITANOTHERE Volume XII January, 1912 Number 1 Published monthly from October to May inclusive by Tue AMERICAN Museum or Naturat History New York City | ONE DOLLAR PER YEAR FIFTEEN CENTS PER COPY American Museum of Natural History Seventy-seventh Street and Central Park West, New York City BOARD OF TRUSTEES President Henry FAIRFIELD OSBORN First Vice-President E Second Vice-President CLEVELAND H. DopGE J. PrerPONT Moraan, JR. Treasurer Secretary CHARLES LANIER ARcHER M. HUNTINGTON Tse Mayor or THe City or New York THe COMPTROLLER OF THE City or NEw YORK THe PRESIDENT OF THE DEvARTMENT OF PARKS ALBERT S. BICKMORE A. D. JuriuiarD GrorGE 8S. Bowporn Gustav E. Kissrt * JoserpaH H. CHOATE Seta Low Tuomas DeWitr CuYLeR OgpEN MILus JAMES: DouGLas J. Prerpont Morcan Mapison GRANT Percy R. PYNE Anson W. Harp WILLIAM ROCKEFELLER ADRIAN ISELIN, JR. JoHNn B. TREVOR ARTHUR CURTISS JAMES Fretix M. WarsureG Watrter B. JAMES GrorGE W. WICKERSHAM EXECUTIVE OFFICERS Director Assistant Secretary Freperic A. Lucas GEorGE H. SHERWOOD Assistant Treasurer Tue Unitep States Trust Company or New YorxkK * Deceased Tue Museum 1s Open FREE TO THE PusLic ON Every Day IN THE YEAR. Tue AmeEeRtcAN Museum or NaATurRAL History was established in 1869 to promote the Natura! Sciences and to diffuse a general knowledge of them among the people, and it is in cordial codéperation with all similar institutions throughout the world.. The Museum authorities are de- pendent upon private subscriptions and the dues from members for procuring needed additions to the collections and for carrying on explorations in America and other parts of the world. The membership fees are, Annual Members. ate ic Pes ss $ 10 Fellows. . Sicyabenara ereseh rey ate se one $ 500 Sustaining Members (Annual) ant kee 25 Patrons. . : Seeds 1000 Life Members: st % nat ienerscise ean 100 Benekevens: (Gift or ~ bequest) 50,000 Tue Museum Library contains more than 60,000 volumes with a good working collection of publications issued by scientific institutions and societies in this country and abroad. The library is open to the public for reference daily — Sundays and holidays excepted — from 9 a. m. to 5 P.M. Tre Museum PUBLICATIONS are issued in six series: The American Museum Journal, Annual Report. Anthropological Papers, Bulletins, Guide Leaflets and Memoirs. Information concerning their sale may be obtained at the Museum Library. Guipes For Stupy or EXHIBITS are provided on request by the Department of Public Education. Teachers wishing to bring classes should write or telephone the Department for an appointment, specifying the collection to be studied. Lectures to classes may also be arranged for. In all cases the best results are obtained with small groups of children. WoORKROOMS AND STORAGE COLLECTIONS may be visited by persons presenting membership tickets The storage collections are open to all persons desiring to examine specimens for special study. Applications should be made at the information desk. Tue Mirta RESTAURANT in the east basement is reached by the elevator and is open from 12 to 5 on all days except Sundays. Afternoon Tea is served from 2 to 5. The Mitla Room is of unusual interest as an exhibition hall being an exact reproduction of temple ruins at Mitla, Mexico. The American Museum Journal CONTENTS FOR JANUARY, 1912 Frontispiece, Dr. Joel Asaph Allen Suoiitiois rom anExplorer s Letters: 2.2... 6,0. c vc eee es cence 3 News from the Arctic expedition with a detailed account of the discovery of an Eskimo tribe which had never seen a white man and of a Scandinavian-like people in Victoria Land A New Restoration of a Titanothere........ WituraM K. GREGORY 15 irasoel Asaph Allen: “An Appreciation. . 2... 206.0. 65 06 ee pe 18 Shell and Pearl Fishing on the Mississippi........ W. P. Herrick 19 Methods of obtaining the pear] clams; market value of shells and pearls Exhibition of the New York Aquarium Society. BASHFORD DEAN 21 The Sun Dance Medicine Bundle................ CLARK WISSLER 24 ne Miseum s Collection of Life Casts..2.....0. .0..4. 6 oa! 26 With photographs illustrating the method of making glue molds for duplicate casts A Note on Poisonous Snakes......... Mary Cyntuta DIcKERSON 30 The Anson W. Hard Collection of Saltillo and Chimayo Blankets. . . 33 Me eTER TGCS) 0-5, te te eo ay os xg, MOE ee a Ae 35 Mary Cynrura Dickerson, Editor Subscription, One Dollar per year. Fifteen cents per copy A subscription to the Journau is included in the membership fees of all classes of Members of the Museum ' “Subscriptions should be addressed to the AMerrtcan Museum Journat, 30 Bolyston St., Cambridge, Mass., or 77th St. and Central Park West, New York City Entered as second-class matter January 12, 1907, at the Post-Office at Boston, Mass. Act of Congress, July 16, 1894 DR. JOEL ASAPH ALLEN One of America’s foremost naturalists and Cean in seniority and accomplishment of the Amer- ican Museum’s scientific staff —‘ Dr, Joel Asaph Allen: An Appreciation,” page 18 The American Museum Journal Vou. XII JANUARY, 1912 No. 1 QUOTATIONS FROM AN EXPLORER’S LETTERS THE MUSEUM’S ARCTIC EXPEDITION | REPORTS SURVEYS OF RIVERS AND LAKES IN THE FROZEN NORTH AND THE DISCOVERY OF A “NEW PEOPLE,” AN ESKIMO TRIBE WHICH HAS NEVER SEEN A WHITE MAN HE main aim of the Museum’s Arctic Expedition, which left New York in 1908, was to investigate the Eskimo both west and east of the Mackenzie River, especially those to the east, little-known tribes in the region of the Coppermine River thought to be more or less uninfluenced by white men. The difficulties in the way of the work have been great, sometimes almost insurmountable; but at last success has been realized both in the work in ethnology for the American Museum and in collateral work undertaken for the Geological Survey of the Canadian Government. In the words of Mr. Stefansson: .... We have covered the last mile geographically that we set out to cover, and have found what we set out to find—a ‘new people,’ less contaminated, more numerous than anyone thought possible. In 1906 authorities thought Victoria Land probably uninhabited. I shall be sur- prised to find its population less than two thousand. We have taken physical measurements, photographs and notes everywhere and have secured and brought to a place of safety a large ethnological collection.”’ Most of the letters come from the expedition’s headquarters in an area of spruce (about ten acres) on the Barren Grounds, Upper Dease River (lat. 67° N., long. 117° 30’ W.). ....April 27, 1910, I started east from Cape Lyon, the most easterly point at which Eskimo houses were seen by Dr. Richardson on his Franklin Search Expedi- tion and the most easterly point known to have been visited by the Western or Baillie Island Eskimo. I hoped to reach by sled people supposed to occupy the coast and islands of Coronation Gulf north and west of the Coppermine. Our progress was slow on account of numerous bad pressure-ridges on the sea ice and a rocky coast which made land travel impracticable. The ice was usually in motion - and open water could be seen less than three miles off shore. Between Cape Lyon and Cape Bexley are traces of former occupation by Eskimo, ruined villages — 1The history of this expedition is found in the November Journat, 1910. Extracts from the letters of Mr. Anderson, the zoélogist of the expedition, will be given in a later issue, as well as further facts regarding the work of Mr. Stefansson. The photographs were taken in March and April, 1911, on Mr. Stefansson's second trip to the Coppermine from Langton Bay (this time accompanied by Mr. Anderson). The plates were exposed under extremely variable light conditions and developed in most unfavorable quarters. 3 perhaps abandoned twenty-five to fifty years ago. The inhabitants of these apparently en- gaged in whaling to judge by the number of whale vertebre scattered about. THE DISCOVERY OF ESKIMO WHO HAVE NEVER SEEN A WHITE MAN At Point Wise we found the first evidences of this year’s travel—pieces of wood cut in two and portions carried off, as material for sleds and bows, no doubt. At Cape Bexley, May 12, we came upon a village of over forty snow houses. These had apparently been re- cently abandoned. Sled-trails led north toward Victoria Land, which is visible across the strait everywhere east of Point Wise. As the ex- plorers of the last century never found people near here, I supposed village and trail evidences of visits of Victoria Land people who had come across the strait to get driftwood. After an hour on the trail, we saw another village and people out sealing — approximately in the mid- dle of Dolphin and Union Strait. Through neglecting the conventional peace signal of the Central Eskimo (extending the arms horizontally) our messenger, who preceded us by a few hundred yards, came near being knifed by the man whom he approached, who Four-year-old Eskimo girl experienc- took his attitude (the arms down) for a chal- Bae Aes BeW sensation of “haying /her lenge or rather a posture of attack. After the picture taken. She is wearing a coat : of long-haired winter caribou skin first parley however, everything was most friendly, and we found them the kindly, cour- teous and generous people that I have everywhere found the less civilized Eskimo to be. We were fed with all the best they had, choice parts of freshly killed seals and huge musk ox horn flagons of steaming blood soup. There was no prying into our affairs or into our baggage; no one entered our house unannounced, and when alone at home the first visitor always approached our house singing so that we had several minutes’ warning of his coming. At this time they had not enough meat to give their dogs more than half-rations, yet ours never wanted a full meal, and our own days were a continual feast. There were thirty-nine individuals in this group, a small part of the A-kit-li-a-kat- tig-mi-ait. Neither they, nor their forefathers as far as they knew, had ever seen a white man, an Indian, or an Eskimo from the west. They considered the Indians bad people as also the Eskimo to the west, but the white men (Ka-blii-nat) they considered good people. That their notion of Kablunat is vague may be seen in that none of them recognized me as one, considering me the older brother of one of my Eskimo. The winter home of the Akuliakattagmiut is in the middle of the strait north of Cape Bexley, but in summer they hunt inland south of Cape Bexley. The territory of these people has been supposed by geographers to be definitely known as uninhab- ited. Their isolation has been complete and largely self-imposed because of their 4 16S 75 iGO 155 150 145 140 135 130 125 120 HS 410 105 100 \ (Ls Ls y ¢ oe NES NX to’ a \ SEY BEE { Wry i / ~— Ci 3 5: \SS Dismal LZ Coronation o Sw ZAIN) | IS? a ul———=2 ITINERARY OF THE STEFANSSON ARTIC EXPEDITION FROM APRIL, 1910 To aApRit, 1911 In late April, 1910, Mr. Stefansson left Langton Bay and Cape Lyon, the latter the most easterly point known to be visited by the Western Eskimo, and traversed the coast of Dolphin and Union Strait to Cape Bexley encountering no Eskimo until the end of the journey when he found a tribe that had never seen a white man. This coast has been skirted by water four times, by Dr. Richardson in the twenties and again in the forties and Captain Collinson in the fifties of the last century and by Amundsen in 1905. These expeditions however, saw little of the land _ In May Mr. Stefdnsson crossed over to Victoria Land, where he discovered a Scandinavian-like people, and then proceeded southward from Liston Island entering the mouth of the Coppermine River in early June. He spent the summer on the Coppermine and Dease Rivers and Dismal Lake. In early November he went to Langton Bay to communicate with Mr. Anderson, crossing one of the largest unexplored regions in Canada. In April, 1911, Mr. Stefansson and Mr. Anderson returned to the Coppermine region 5 5 noqtdeo Jo Jaquinu [[VUs B yNq PUR SPI Mof a1 919} ysnoyyye “yno19 Ty AdaAo UO punoy aie soyIs due. OWLS ‘Aopxog odeQ YO Sursoqurm ‘40-1UI-5y ayor1y WIM punoqge SIoATI pue spuod o10yM ‘outueddoy 94} Jo sve dovy T OULYsSy Aq poJIqeyU Useq sey 4te1}5 MOTU{) pure urydjod jo 4ysvoo at} ITV -\ey-e--0y-y ou) st dnoaB AyAo}soM ysow oY} MOU 4nq ‘souTy? JOUMOS Ut SuYnN4 40 400¥ SMITLNSL V HLIM ASMOHMONS OWIMSA ek oh ee: aR rs, y SJOLYSIP OSoy} UL FuOARsy o[IYM AaQUNOD 9y) UO AAT] OF OTGIssodumr AT[RoNoORAd aq [IM 41 savox uo} UT “Sparq JO SULTS oY} UOAD PUR SUTYS XOJ ‘suTYs JIOM ‘noqMeo [ING JO sopry osn OF paddoJ oav o[dood oy} yey MOU aR OS ere PUR ‘SUPIS ‘OUIT} S,UOSpaRyory JO Noqueds JO Jaquinu oy Jo Yue. Jod uag you sey uolsea ouruIeddog UMBJ UL possoap OwUPysy YVYyQ Voy} [NJMUeTd Os o1OM NOqIIR) ou, ‘“peydosop pue ssojewes MoU SI ‘Ose savok AQXIS OURS Jo [[NJ ‘UOTsoI AaIVq odeO 9YL ono1y of) Ul aRoA YORo ureyqo OF YMOWIp o10ur st AytUeNdb ut ‘aTqejidsoy pure snodoues A[jeuoMdooxe oe o[dood & sR OUWIIYSH OULL poo} ‘OAOMOY {S}SoNS YILM 10 JoYJOUR OUO YITM JSR] OY OF PoOoJ aToyy oreys Loy, sonoary poso[dxo oy Jo qavd soyjo Aue jo o[dood oY} Op UL} ooVd OPI OY} YIM JouqUOD ssoT SUT} UOSoIder SHY} “WRU OTA UOOS JOAN OARY OYA Uo LJUOM) UY O1OTU OU UTRIMOD JIRAVE UOTUA pu UTYd[od pur JiNy WOTBUOIOD JO SopIs OMY 94} UO OLULYS| puRsNoy} ouo oT, R ASNYHNOP BHL YOS SGAIS SHL WOVd GNV dWVO AYVAYE NOSSNVSSLS “HW ONId TSH OWINSA ‘ Arctic expedition camp near Kendall River. The camp meatrack is built high to protect from foxes and wolverines a Group of Eskimo helping Mr. Stefansson to break camp and pack. It is said that no Eskimo of the Coppermine region can count beyond five 8 QUOTATIONS FROM AN EXPLORER’S LETTERS , fear and distrust of white men, of Indians and of the Eskimo to the west. Of one thing I am glad, that I have had an opportunity to see that all the best qualities of the civilized Eskimo are found more fully among their uncivilized countrymen. SOME ETHNOLOGICAL RESULTS OF THE EXPEDITION TO THE COPPERMINE RIVER We are able to assign a population of about one thousand to the sea coasts lying between Kent peninsula and Cape Bexley — of these we have seen about two hundred and fifty persons, but we have seen some representative of every group. We are able to extend the geographic range of the Eskimo west of the Copper- mine considerably to the south and to the west on the mainland beyond what was previously known to any explorer, and to show that this is not a recent spread or extension of territorial limits, but that owing to the choice of seasons by previous travelers it was not possible for them to know when they were within the limits of contemporaneous Eskimo occupation. We can show a correspondence in culture greater than hitherto known between the Central (Coronation Gulf) Eskimo and the tribes who are their neighbors to the south. It seems likely that the evidence, when sifted, will show a focal point farther west than formerly believed, from which the Eskimo have spread east and west in former times. We are able to extend the range of the wood-and-earth house, of permanent villages and of bowhead whaling some seventy-five or one hundred miles farther east than the limit assigned by the only previous observer, Dr. Richardson. We have seen the manufacture and use of “primitive”? hunting implements before the people knew firearms. From our knowledge of the Western Eskimo and our experience this year to the east, we can adduce more numerous and stronger proofs than known before to show the extreme, almost unbelievable conservatism of the Eskimo — apart from what our collections, ethnological and archeological, may show. For instance, an Eskimo woman will always turn over pieces of boiling meat, believing they will not cook well on both sides although completely immersed in water. This belief comes from the days several generations back when cooking was done in shallow stone pots where the pieces of meat were seldom more than half covered and had to be turned over. THE DISCOVERY OF A SCANDINAVIAN-LIKE PEOPLE IN VICTORIA LAND We have found (May 17, 1910) a North European-looking people, the Ha-né- r4g-mi-at of Victoria Land north from Cape Bexley. Their total number is about forty, of whom I saw seventeen, and was said not to have seen the blondest of the group. They are markedly different from any American aborigines I have seen; they suggest, in fact, a group of Scandinavian or North European peasants. Perhaps better than my characterization of them was that of my Alaskan Eskimo companion, who has worked for ten.or more years on a whaling vessel: ‘‘They are not Eskimo, they are fo’ec’sle men.’’ Two of them had full chin beards to be described as light, tending to red; every one had light eyebrows; one — perhaps the darkest of all — had hair that curled slightly. The Eskimo physical type varies considerably from Greenland to Siberia. It may be that all these variants are due partly to blood mixture, and that the earlier, purer type was more ‘‘ European” in character than we have been thinking. On the other hand, there may have been direct admixture of European blood. In the fifteenth century there disappeared from Greenland the Icelandic (Norse- Keystone of dome of snow house about to be put in place Ear th-shod iced runners of Coronation Gulf sled packed in snow to pre- vent ice from melting Teutonic) colony in its en- tirety. This colony had a bishop of the Church of Rome, two monasteries, a nunnery, fourteen churches and over three thousand inhabitants, who at one time sailed their own ships to Norway, to Ice- land and to America. [Leif Ericson was one of these Greenlanders, and to the gen- eral public best known of them all.] This colony was in a fairly prosperous condi- tion as late as 1412 and we have Vatican documents of a later date referring to it; when Hans Egede came there in the seventeenth century he found only house ruins to tell the story, and no sure trace of Scandinavianism in the language or blood of the Greenland Eskimo. Either the colony had been massacred by the Eskimo, had disappeared through famine or pestilence, or had emigrated ina body. This last view many scholars have favored from the first, and if they did emigrate they may be represented in part by the present inhabitants of Victoria Land. There are many philological points to suggest Scandinavian origin of these people. For instance, their word for “wolf” is arg-lak, a word conveying no analogy to any of my companions, even after they understood its meaning. Now the common Old Norse word for “wolf” is varg-uwr. Not to go into fine philological reasoning, it is enough to say that an Eskimo is as likely to attach a -lak to a foreign word as an Italian is to attach a final-o. One of the characteristics of the Hancrag- miut dialect is the dropping of initial consonants. Thus the Icelandic vargur becomes arg-ur; change the final syllable to -luk (as Herschel Islanders change Cottle to Kar- luk) and you have arg-liak. We heard here also a song alliterated in much the Old Norse scaldic style. This sort of alliteration and anklang is unknown to me personally or through books as’a feature of Eskimo songs anywhere. Again, in the forties of the last century Franklin’s expedition with its full comple- ment of men was lost near the east coast of Victoria Land. Some of these men are accounted for by journal entries of officers who themselves later perished, and others by graves and unburied skeletons along the route toward Back’s River. Franklin’s men must have known there was a boat route to the Hudson Bay Company’s posts on the Mackenzie River, for Franklin’s own three expeditions had discovered and mapped it chiefly by boat voyages. Is it unlikely then that some of his men attempted this route? And even if they did not, might not a few of his men have found their way to the Eskimo of Victoria Land and have had sufficient adaptability to learn Eskimo methods of self-support? A readily apparent objection to this hypothesis is that 10 Eskimo family approaching snow house village. Far at the left is seen the snow house built for Mr. Stefansson by these Eskimo, who served him as an honored guest Deserted winter village on the ice of Dolphin and Union Strait off the mouth of the Coppermine River. Eskimo snow villages melt in summer and even when built on shore leave little trace Nauyak, an Eskimo of the expedition, moving camp. The dogs are harnessed in pairs 1l Coronation Gulf island. Islands of the Coppermine region invariably present a vertical cliff on ‘the southern side and slope to the water’s level at the north Ivarluk with the frame of his kayak. Much of this country gives an impression of measureless expanse of snow Mud cliff along the Coppermine River, one haif mile south of Bloody Fall. The summer of 1910 spent in the Coppermine region brought great discomfort because of mosquitoes. The dogs’ feet were protected from becoming sore from the stings by boots of caribou skin — when the dogs could be persuaded not to eat them off 12 QUOTATIONS FROM AN EXPLORER’S LETTERS 13 even Franklin’s whole complement of men would be, if amalgamated with the entire body of Victoria Land Eskimo, insufficient to produce the markedly European type actually found to-day. The validity of this objection can be judged only after we have a complete census of the island and know how far the new type is present in some localities above others. In regard to the possibility of Franklin’s men having survived for a time, there is the interesting contributory evidence that there are at various places people said to be “named with the names of white men.’’ One name in particular we have found in practically every community: ‘Nérk.”’ This is, at Herschel and farther west, the Eskimo pronunciation of the English ‘‘ Ned.” OBSERVATIONS AND SURVEYS IN ONE OF THE LARGEST UNEXPLORED AREAS IN CANADA! Eastward from Cape Lyon open water was continually seen from three to ten miles off shore till we reached Inman’s River, when the edge of the flow made off diagonally toward Prince Albert Sound, Victoria Land. There were heavy pressure- ridges close inshore. In my opinion, if a sled journey were attempted from Cape Parry to Nelson Head, Banks Land, as has been proposed, it could be more safely and easily accomplished (and probably more quickly as well) by crossing the strait east of Inman’s River rather than by going directly across between the mentioned head- lands. East of Point Wise the ice of Dolphin and Union Strait is always compara- tively level and on it the Eskimo of the strait have their winter houses. Although this is the first time the coast of the strait has been traversed in winter, it has been four times skirted by water —by Dr. Richardson in the twenties and again in the forties and Captain Collinson in the fifties of the last century and by Amundsen in 1905. Amundsen saw little of the land, of course. Dr. Richardson’s geological notes of the coast, on the other hand, are full and beyond addition by me at present. The prevailing winds in the strait and Coronation Gulf in winter, as clearly shown by the snowdrifts are northwest. For this reason there is plenty of drift- wood along the mainland coast east beyond Cape Bexley but none on the Victoria Land coast. Entering the Coppermine, we found the first spruce shrubs a mile north of Bloody Fall. The fallitself, by the way, is no fall at all, but a rapid about six hundred yards long that reminded me somewhat of the Whitehorse Canon of the Yukon. From the appearance of trees, the tree-line is within four miles east of the river till one passes the Musk Ox rapids; here a stream (about the size of Kendall River) enters from the east, and up this are trees for about ten miles. Of this river I made a compass survey some fifteen miles up. Eskimo camp sites east of the Coppermine and north of this small river are on practically every hilltop, ‘“‘buttes” they would be called in the American Southwest. Numerous ponds and some creeks and rivers abound in Arctic trout; there are no geese, cranes or swans, few ducks and few birds of any _ kind as compared with other Arctic districts I know; caribou are in some number, Dismal Lake I found to be about as charted by Hanbury and not as on previous maps. The eastern branch of the Dease River has its source in a small creek that heads about eight miles SW. (true) from the narrows of Dismal Lake (lat. 67° 24’). This creek runs SW. some seven miles into a lake called by the Eskimo “‘ I-ma-ér’-nirk’’. The lake is some four by seven miles, its long axis SW.-NE. Of this and the ‘Quotations from a letter to Director R. W. Brock, Geological Survey, Canada. 14 THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL Upper Dease and the portage route from Dismal Lake to Imaernirk I have made a survey. I have obtained specimens of what I think is rich iron ore from Victoria Land north of Cape Bexley. Copper is picked up almost anywhere by the natives in the whole Coronation Gulf district, each family having its favorite place to search for material for knives and arrows. The spot most in repute however is a short dis- tance north of Dismal Lake. I have several of these copper specimens. After spending several months on the lower Horton River and a like period on the Coppermine, I am of the opinion that Horton River is fully as large a stream. Mr. Stefainsson made a compass survey in December, 1910, of Horton River from the point nearest Langton Bay to within seventy miles of Bear Lake, taking also a collection of rock specimens. ] The expedition’s opportunities for ethnological study in this region are thought to be better now than they are likely ever to be again; the expedi- tion is well placed in regard to outfit and food supplies, while sophistication and changes in the material life of the Eskimo will progress rapidly, due to the trade relations which have been opened with the Bear Lake Indians during this summer of 1911. To the regret of Mr. Stefansson, the expedi- tion itself has helped to hasten the end of the isolation of the Eskimo. They came to trust him, a white man, also his Eskimo from the West, and learned from these Eskimo that Indians are a harmless people nowadays and besides have an abundance of iron and other articles valuable to possess. Therefore it is the desire of the expedition, notwithstanding the home- sickness.of the men, to remain in the field still another year because of their great opportunities for work. White fox in trap; photograph taken at a distance of six feet. A white fox skin is worth about six dollars in the Arcties and seventy-five skins, the equivalent of four hundred and fifty dollars, is a large number to be taken in one year. The present shortage on the market in Russian white fox will cause rapid destruction of the species in Arctic America A NEW RESTORATION OF A TITANOTHERE By William K. Gregory NE of the chief objects of the American Museum’s department of vertebrate paleontology is to let the public discover that fossils are not necessarily dry and unprofitable, but on the con- trary full of interest and meaning. Every legitimate resource of science and art is employed to clothe, as it were, the dry bones with flesh — to picture the jolly ichthyosaur disporting once more in the waves, or the tyrannosaur harassing his sluggish foe. Mr. Erwin 8. Christman has recently made some very effective restora- tions, especially those of the primitive “elephants,” Moritherium and Paleomastodon. Under the direction of Professor Osborn and the writer, in conference with other members of the staff, he is now at work upon a series of full-size heads to illustrate the evolution of the titanotheres, distant relatives of the rhinoceroses, which ran through their Titanothere skull and model of full-size head in process of preparation. The skull is first copied exactly in a clay model. Additional clay to represent the flesh is then added to the outside of the skull model. The photograph shows the right half of the model completed and the left half still revealing the clay skull which makes the foundation 15 SOSOIDIOUIY.A OY} JO SOA VIO JUVISIP JOUTIXO ‘soso JOUR} BY JO MOLN[OAY 94} MOYS OF Spee OZIS [TNF jo Solos B UO YAOM 4B MOT ST ‘MOT}OV [[NJ UL Sastoy BUIAT[ JO S[OPOUL JO Soles B BAOD[Y OSIOF{ OY} AOJ OPVUT SVT OUM “WRUNSMYO “S UMA “ATT 4900} Surpuis isay oy puryoq ATPensn pue}xe you sop s[eUTUR SNOAOATqJOY UT YJNoU oy) Jo o[sur oY, ‘esxeT 003 Ayqeqoad sy os0Y pojuasoided sev YNour stL, SYSHLONVLIL VY DNIISGOW A NEW RESTORATION OF A TITANOTHERE Lh known evolutionary history in the first half of the Age of Mammals. The last and greatest member of the titanotheres is the flat-horned Brontotherium platyceras, and a brief review of our reasons for representing this animal as it here appears may serve to illustrate one or two principles in the art of restoring extinct animals. The skull was first modeled in clay from a well- preserved fossil specimen. The clay to represent the flesh was then laid in on one side of the skull model, the other side being left exposed temporarily to show the supposed relations between skull contour and external form. The top and sides of the head offered no especial difficulty, since the location of the principal muscle-masses of the temporal region and jaws could be inferred by comparison with the corresponding parts in the skulls of recent rhinoceroses and other distant relatives of the brontothere. The flattened “horns” (bony outgrowths from the skull) for various reasons were represented as covered with very tough hide rather than with true horn. The nose and nostrils were restored after careful comparison with many animals, especially the “black” rhinoceros, whose bony nasal region is essentially similar to that of the brontothere. The most difficult part is the mouth and here present-day animals offer some at first rather contradictory evidence. In both the “black” and the “white” rhinoceroses of Africa the front teeth of the upper and lower jaws are lacking in the adult and the corresponding bony parts are reduced. From this similarity we might be led to expect that the lips of the two were also similar. And yet, as a matter of fact, the “black” rhinoceros in adaptation to its habits of plucking up roots and shrubs, has a pointed or prehensile upper lip; while in the “white” rhino, which feeds exclusively upon grass, the upper lip is very broad and square. The Asiatic rhinoceros, which feeds in the “grass jungles,” has large cutting upper incisors and divergent lower tusks; its upper lip is pointed, but less than in the “ black”’ species. These examples indicate that at least in the rhinoceroses the shape of the upper lip depends less upon the form and arrangement of the front teeth than upon the nature of the food and the mode of tearing it up from the ground. The grinding teeth of the brontothere seem to be fitted to crush and cut up vegetation of a somewhat coarser nature than the tender shrubs and roots which form the principal food of the “black” rhino. Still less was the brontothere a true grazer, for in comparison with the “white” rhino, its grinders had low crowns and lacked the “cement” which is so character- istic of the teeth of grass-loving ungulates. Also its front teeth were feeble, their prehensile function being very possibly usurped by a heavy upper lip. Hence it seems probable that the brontothere fed on coarse shrubs and roots and had a heavy, prehensile upper lip; accordingly it is this type of lip which Mr. Christman has given to his model. DR. JOEL ASAPH ALLEN: AN APPRECIATION HE JourNnat congratulates itself on the privilege of publishing as its frontispiece the portrait of Dr. Joel Asaph Allen, dean in senior- ity and accomplishment of the American Museum’s scientific staff. While the past quarter of a century has swept by with its political problems and its economic struggles, one man has sat at his desk in the American Museum content to do the work that crowded before him. To-day this man is one of the country’s great men of science with but few who can equal him in achievement. Dr. Allen came to the American Museum in 1885 from the Museum of Comparative Zodlogy at Cambridge where he had been assistant in orni- thology and mammalogy and for many years a student under Agassiz, hav- ing been fortunate enough to accompany Agassiz on the Thayer expedition to Brazil and the Amazon. He is one of the men to whom has passed the spirit of devotion for natural history that Agassiz felt and the inspiration Agassiz gained in early comradeship with Carl Schimper and others and later from Oken and Cuvier. Dr. Allen on leaving Cambridge was already a scientist of renown, but it is at the American Museum that he has done the bulk of his work leading the institution to honor through the high character of his researches and receiving in return unusual opportunity —in this case opportunity that forced much of his investigation into the definite lines of the systematist. Zoological classification however is a far different thing to-day from what it was in the time of Linnzus or even of the great naturalists of a century ago, for the lines of descent and blood relationship can be drawn close in accordance with very extensive knowledge in comparative anatomy, his- tology and embryology, paleontology and geographical distribution. But the man who rises to first rank must have a master mind that can make a wide sweep of this modern horizon as well as the keen eye of the master observer and the discriminating judicial power by which to disentangle the contradictions of a multitudinous: bibliography. Dr. Allen has been one of the men to shape zodélogical classification and keep it in line. He has described new families and genera and many hun- dreds of new species and through a close study of geographical distribution in relation to species formation, has also drawn the distinctions clearer in many series of intergrading subspecies. His researches have been pub- lished under some fifteen hundred titles, some of which like his American Bisons, 1876, and History of North American Pinnipedia, 1897, are in book form and others in articles and monographs appearing in the Bulletins and Memoirs of the Museum of Comparative Zoédlogy and of the American Museum of Natural History, and also scatteringly in the Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington, U. S. National Museum, Boston Society of Natural History, Philadelphia Academy of Sciences and U. S. 18 SHELL AND PEARL FISHING ON THE MISSISSIPPI 19 Geological Survey. He has also been a constant contributor to Science and the American Naturalist, always making his points in strong, clear English and with a simple and forceful style. The same powers of mind which make him a great naturalist give him success as editor. He has had in charge the Bulletin and Memoirs of the American Museum since 1887, has edited the Bulletin of the Nuttall Ornithological Club for eight years and for a period of twenty-eight years has been editor of The Auk, the official publication of the Ornithological Union. It has been the quiet, continual and thorough work of Dr. Allen as editor of The Auk and in the council of the American Ornithological Union that has proved one of the most important factors in keeping alive in America the interest in ornithology aroused at the time of the publication of Coues’ Key to North American Birds. Although perhaps not conscious of the fact, Dr. Allen is a great force in the American Museum. At the head of the department of mammalogy and ornithology for twenty-seven years, neither the possible official power of the position nor the necessary routine have kept him from continual and arduous scientific investigation and from giving with great broad- mindedness equality of opportunity to those working with him; as a result the department has set an example as a producing power and enforced the truth emphatically set forth in the lives of eminent naturalists heretofore that definite scientific knowledge, the summation of which constitutes the basis for the world’s progress, can be gained only by single-mindedness of purpose that is forgetful of self. SHELL AND PEARL FISHING ON THE MISSISSIPPI By W. P. Herrick Dr. Herrick is engaged in a study of the fresh water pearl clams and the pearl fisheries of the United States, especially in such questions as the number of pearls secreted relative to hardness of the water, and to distortion of the shell and other diseased conditions of the clam. He spent several months at the Mississippi pearl fisheries during the past summer and has recently been making use of the Museum library in his work. He has engaged to supply the new Shell Hall with materials for a display illustrative of the pearl industry.— Editor. YOUNG workman in Germany, who had served an apprenticeship in making buttons from bone and from the marine mother-of-pearl, received a present of some shells said to have come from the rivers of America. These lay in a dusty corner of his shop until finally he deter- mined to work up a few into buttons. He found the material desirable, and the price of marine shell being high, started at once for the United States, taking with him his small foot-power machine. On arrival he worked his way slowly westward examining the rivers for shells. One day a man watching his work said, “ You ought to go to the Mississippi where 20 THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL you can get those shells by the cartload.”’ He proceeded to the Mississippi. There shells were gathered, a few buttons finished and taken to Chicago. A little perseverance found a market at a good profit, but reluctance at handling the small output of one workman. A partner was enlisted, more machines purchased, workmen personally instructed and the button industry was established — which has made the city of Muscatine on the Mississippi. This was about 1890. The young man, Mr. J. F. Beopple, is now government shell expert at Fairport on the Mississippi, and the present size of this fresh water pearl and button industry although difficult to state exactly is estimated at about seven million dollars annually. The surround- ings, the element of chance in pear! fishing, and the enormous growth and kaleidoscopic changes in the button industry all lend romance to the work. The Mississippi at Fairport is about a mile wide, with large islands and baylike sloughs, and although the winding channel is twenty feet deep, there are flats which may appear when the river falls a few feet and consid- erable areas of country of such level that it may be covered quickly by a corresponding rise. The water is very muddy (with about one hundred and ten parts hardness to the million) and has an average current of three miles an hour increased after a heavy rain and often emphasized by the wind, while the spring ice sweeps away any ordinary dock. Under these condi- tions the methods of obtaining the shells are three: Wading proves effective in shoal water or when the river is low; raking from an anchored skiff is a method much used in deeper water by skillful fishermen, although labori- ous and impossible when the river is rough; while dredging, “drifting with a brail,” is probably the method most generally in use. The “brail”’ or crow foot dredge is dragged astern and the so-called “mule,” a three or four foot square of boards with a wooden handle on top, is dropped flatside to the current off the bow of the boat and held in this position by ropes to give power and steadiness to the craft. When the down river side of the bed is reached, both dredge and mule are hauled aboard, and the clams removed from the hooks of the dredge. Then the fisherman “chugs” with his motor or rows to the up current side and the drift is repeated hour after hour. The mollusks lie partly buried in the mud at the bottom of the river and the hooks of the dredge brush between the shell’s two open valves, which snap shut in a grasp so tenacious that their edges are often broken in getting out the hooks. An average of three or four hundred pounds daily is con- sidered a good haul. The work may be carried on by a single fisherman near his home, or by one or more families which camp on the river bank, shifting location when the catch proves poor. After being brought to the shore the mollusks are steamed that the valves may open and the meats may be more or less separated from them. Then the shells are thrown into a pile and the meats are put on the sorting- SHELL AND PEARL FISHING ON THE MISSISSIPPI 21 board for the search for pearls. There are so-called “ pearlers’”’ who do not steam the clams but open them with a knife, but these are few. Admitted that in “cooking out” pearls occasionally drop to the hot bottom of the pan and are burned and that some experts believe that the steaming injures the lustre of the pearl, the former rarely happens in reality as the finest round pearls are apt to be imbedded in the flesh of the body of the mol- lusk, and as regards the latter, the verdict is by no means unanimous. Both fishermen and shell buyers agree also that the shells — which have a market value fully equal to the pearl find — are cleaner and better when “cooked out” than when “soured out” or when cleaned with a knife. The work of going over the meats by hand for pearls is often done by the women of the family while the fisherman is making his next day’s catch. Locally the name of “ pearl”’ is reserved for the pieces which have a complete skin and are symmetrical, those spherical being called round pearls, those flattened button pearls — “balloon,” “ pear-shaped”’ or “drop”’ as the case may be. The white pieces are now especially in demand for ladies’ ear studs, and thus when perfect and of fine lustre are of considerable market value. Other forms though typical and not attached to the shell, are called “slugs.” There are almost limitless varieties of these in size, shape, color and lustre, and they have many names such as “nuggets,” “points,” “wings,” and “angel wings.” The ordinary slugs are usually sold to local or traveling pearl buyers, bringing from two dollars and a half to forty dollars an ounce. Thus the raw material is obtained. When several tons of the shells have been accumulated, they are sold, usually to a representative of the nearest button-cutting factory. Good shells during the past summer were bringing about twenty-three dollars a ton. It is considered that the shells give the necessary wage, the pearls furnish the fascination and give the profit — if there is any. This summer one pearl was found valued at nineteen hundred dollars, while there are quite a number of fishermen in the vicinity who have worked many years without finding one worth fifty and are still expecting the perfect pearl. EXHIBITION OF THE NEW YORK AQUARIUM SOCIETY By Bashford Dean Photographs by Dr. Fritz Bade HE New York Aquarium Society held its second annual exhibition at the Museum during early December, its first annual meeting having been held in the New York Aquarium. It was evident that the exhibition appealed to people of many kinds, quite beyond the technical circle of aquarists—which is already large. Thus there were 22 THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL many young visitors, who came and observed the fishes critically as a result of their first experiments in aquarium keeping; on the other hand, there were professional zodlogists who came to see some of the fishes alive which they had known only on the shelves of museums. The aquaria were nearly a hundred in number, mainly small ones, balanced (still water), attractively displayed, showing besides fishes, rare aquatic vegetation and a number of curious invertebrates. Popular ex- hibits there were, of course, in number: gold fishes of many forms — “fan- tails,” “ telescopes,’ “comets,” “fringetails,’’ some admirable specimens both Chinese and Japanese, including some of the variety which is short and heavy of body and blunt of tail, especially prized by the Japanese fanciers. Then there were paradise fish (Zacropodus) of all sizes, which is sib to the famous gourami, the most delicately flavored of all East Indian food fishes, as well as to the Bengalese 7'richogaster common in the Calcutta market — here also shown living. But the feature of the exhibition was the number and interest of the exotic forms represented, creatures which one is apt to know only from pictures in textbooks. Thus there was the water butterfly, Pantodon (African), said to be a “flying fish,” although judging from the habits of the fish in the aquarium, the stroke of its filmy tail does not allow it to spring far out of water. There was Mastacembelus, an Indian “eel” which is not an eel. There was an Indian Ophiocephalus which can live beneath sun-baked mud and which under ordinary conditions breathes partly by means of a “lung,” and resembles outwardly the American ganoid Ama, which, by the way, is also more or less of an air breather. There were several genera of cichlids, perchlike fishes, tropical American, and of cha- racinids which replace the tribe of carps in Africa and South America, and include the most formidable fresh water fishes in the world. There were tropical catfishes which are rarely seen out of their native waters, among them Macrones (East Indian) with bright bands of color and exaggerated “feelers,” also a South American Dorad, its body half covered with armor, and its fully armored cousin, Callichthys, which is probably the most eccentric of all catfishes. There were forms whose habits of reproduction are extraordinary, like Gambusia, Girardina, Pecilia, which bear living young, and were exhibited beside their youngsters. Finally, there was not lacking the pla-kat, or Malayan fighting fish, Betta pugnax, a veritable aquatic game-cock reared for shows ef fish-fighting which in Siam draw throngs of spectators. special credit in bringing together many of these exotic and rare forms is due to Mr. Isaac Buchanan, an amateur who devotes much time to the study of aquarial fishes, and it was similar interests which led Mr. Richard Dorn, president of the society, to organize the present display. The society itself is made up mainly of amateurs; it includes near- ly a hundred members, a number of whom are Ger- man-Americans who have brought over the sea their love of this form of nature study; for in Germany the aquarium societies are old and widely-spread — institu- tions, attracting and _ train- ing many naturalists. The present society may even be regarded as a filiale of the widespread German organ- ization “Triton.” The present exhibition demonstrates again, and in A fish (Ophiocephalus) of India which can live under sun-baked mud East Indian catfish (JJacrones), bright colored and with long feelers an attractive way, the value of keeping an aquarium, not as a hobby merely, but also as a means of studying the habits and development of many aquatic forms which would otherwise be inaccessible to naturalists. It even puts within range of its owner some of the large questions which these forms illustrate, as for example the variation of aquatic animals and plants under artificial conditions, and the way in which these variations are passed on to the young, ques- tions which lead far into the field of Darwinism. Nor can we leave out of account the experimental value of the aquarium, in testing how fishes can be reared, and what are the best conditions for breeding them, questions which touch practical fish- eries. The success of the pres- ent exhibition leads one to hope that similar displays will be held annually. In Siam rival specimens of Betta pugnazx are pitted against each other like game cocks 23 THE SUN DANCE MEDICINE BUNDLE A POWER IN APPEALS FOR LIFE. OPENED ONLY IN SACRED CEREMONIAL FOR THE FULFILLMENT OF A WOMAN’S VOW By Clark Wissler MONG the exhibits for the Plains Indians may be found the bundle for the medicine woman in the Blackfoot sun dance, a simple outfit far more sacred than even the medicine pipe. The chief object is a headdress built on a strip of rawhide in the form of a lizard. On the head- dress in front is what is spoken of as a doll, which contains a prairie turnip. All this together with certain paints is kept in a cylindrical raw- hide case, in fact is never taken out except when the appropriate ritual is performed. Attached to the case is a digging stick, woman’s primitive tool and with these Indians the symbol of her fall. As their old sacred story runs, a virgin loved the morning star and was carried by him to the home of his heavenly parents, the sun and moon, where she took up the domestic duties of a wife. As on earth, she gathered roots for the table with her digging stick, but one large fine prairie turnip she was forbidden to dig up. Now like the woman of our own sacred story, she yielded to curiosity and thrust her stick under the turnip. Sorrow and grief for her people below were now her portion and she was banished to earth, but directed to teach the lesson and confer a medicine bundle on her descendants. Since the bundle came from the house of the sun, it symbolizes much of his power and might. This medicine bundle finds its chief function in the fulfillment of a vow — a woman’s vow. If a dear one is near unto death, a woman may stand before the sun and say, “Hear me, I am virtuous, I have been true to my marriage bond; if our dear one is spared, I will open the bundle at the sun dance.”’ A medicine man is usually called to take formal note of the vow and to direct the unhappy one. Now the sun is not deceived and if an unworthy woman so address him, retribution is certain. Further, this woman must at the next sun dance make public confession of all tempta- tions she has experienced. Yet more, this public confession is also a chal- lenge and it is the duty of every bystander to impeach her, if there is aught to impeach. Following the vow are months of preparation. At the time of the sun dance the woman fasts four days and on the last day the bundle is opened, the headdress placed on her brow and the digging stick on ber back. The ritual is long, requiring most of the day for its many songs and prayers. In one place a solemn medicine man while dancing with the stick rehearses 24 the digging of that first forbidden turnip. At last the woman is conducted to the sun dance place where made. her confession is The bundle she cares for until some other woman makes a vow. The whole tribe has an interest in this ceremony. They camp ina great circle and await the issue of those four days, for should there be a fault, all would The of the woman with this re- suffer. appearance galia is the great ceremoni- al moment of the tribe, all are there to see and stand in reverent silence. That the bundle is here is due to our late friend The Bear-One. One day Blackfoot sweat the sun dance ritual! The we received a letter in which he stated that the bundle owned by a certain woman could be had for the cost of a few presents to her family. We learned later that the husband of the bun- dle-owner had died. During his illness the woman prayed to the bundle and made a vow to the sun. Now if such a plea is of no avail, the woman is released from her obligation, but more, she is then under the displeasure of the sun and should get clear of the bundle. Because of the disrepute this bundle was now in, no one would care to take it and the poor widow looked upon it as the real cause of her husband’s death. The reader must know that the taking of a bundle is like entering into marriage, one cannot escape the bonds without scandal and crime, except in the regular man- ner. us such a bundle under normal conditions; as it was, the risk was great. Misfortune and sudden death were predicted for him; in fact his end re- cently, some two years after the events of this story, was regarded as proof of the sun’s displeasure. Even one so powerful as our friend could not have ventured to give 1 Through a mistaken transference of captions on page 299 of the December JouRNAL, the discovery of the Blackfoot sun dance was accredited to Dr. Pliny E. Goddard. The investigations of Dr. Goddard concerned the sun dance of the Pla:ns Cree. 25 house ceremony is a part of Building the frame of wil- lows Procession of holy men in sun-wise direction | Entering for the purifica- tion rites THE MUSEUM’S COLLECTION OF LIFE CASTS WITH PHOTOGRAPHS ILLUSTRATING THE METHOD OF MAKING DUPLICATE CASTS FOR EXCHANGE WITH OTHER INSTITUTIONS HE origin of the primitive races of the New World and their possible relations to the geographically isolated races of the Old World is one of the most interesting questions of ethnological research, which if it ever comes to anything must needs reach its results through com- parative study of the races themselves in their physical types and their cultures. In this country especial interest has attached to study of the Indian tribes of the northwest coast of North America for comparison with northern Asiatic tribes, with a view to establishing proofs of the derivation of the western tribes from the eastern, or at least of a mingling of the two Model of a head of which duplicate casts are desired. The model is covered with a half-inch thickness of clay [a small part of the clay is cut away to show the face of the model underneath] and a two-piece plaster mold is made over the clay. "When the plaster has hardened, the mold is taken off, and the clay is removed from the model 26 The mold is like a jacket or hood, separated from the model by just the thickness of the clay. Model and jacket are given a coat of shellac and one of oil, then are put back in position and the space between them filled with glue The glue hardens to form a mold within the plaster jacket, the model of the head having been removed. [The photographs illustrate the process in connection with three different busts.] A glue mold is firm enough to give an accurate cast, yet yielding enough to allow its removal from about the cast, however many undercuts the plaster surface may present 27 28 THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL during the age of land connection of the two continents. Interest has cen- tered also in an investigation of the tribes of the Southwest and of the islands of the Pacific with reference to establishing possible connection between the Old and New Worlds at this point through the widespread Polynesians. The American Museum has unusual hopes for the future of this research be- cause of large equipment for the study in life casts of physical types. In 1906 the institution possessed more than five hundred masks from life, and the number has steadily in- creased until it has become a very complete collection. There is a full series of Siberian casts, actually made in the field on the Jesup North Paci- fic Expeditions, a complete Eskimo series, made pretty much throughout the length and breadth of the Arctic regions, and an elaborate series representing every type of culture of the North American Indian, being especially strong for the Northwest Coast, the Plains, California and the Southwest. In addition the Museum possesses a scat- tering series for South America and_ the South Pacific Islands, representative of such Patagonians, Maori, Samoans, and Filipinos. Almost without exception these stand for actual field study of the given race and are accompanied by a long series of photographs and careful color studies for many subjects. Ethnology draws many conclusions from skull study but these results must of neces- sity be incomplete as compared with records based on casts from life which give perfect races as * an Indian head. Mr. James C. Bell, expert worker in plaster, making a glue mold of Glue is poured into the funnel, the lower end of which opens into a half-inch space between the original model and the plaster jacket fitting over it. As the glue rises in this space about the model, holes previously cut in the jacket to allow the escape of air are plugged with clay. Finally the funnels at the top and side are capped with clay and the glue is allowed to set for twelve hours THE MUSEUM’S COLLECTION OF LIFE CASTS 29 contour of head and accurate detail of feature. The accuracy of the casts has steadily risen during recent years with the perfecting of methods of technique. Formerly the man who allowed a plaster mold of his head to be taken was subjected to considerable discomfort, which resulted in a cast in which the features were so distorted that it could serve only as a basis from which the sculptor modeled the finished bust; but since the paraffin method has been in use the cast can be gained without distress to the subject, therefore the expression remains true to life and all measure- ments are accurate. This removal of the necessity of doing any modeling on the casts and therefore of the sculptor’s temptation to conventionalize his work has been a most important factor for truth in the ethnological investigations underway. In addition to this largest research value of the Museum’s several hundred casts, lesser values are continually realized. Exhibition is of course one of the immediate purposes of the casts. If it is desired to study any given tribe, the exhibition hall shows not only the articles of its culture but also accurate representations of the people themselves. And further- more, the Museum has continual demand for duplicate casts from universi- ties and colleges and other museums, as well as from artists and various private parties interested in Indian or other primitive types of man. Thus the collection extends its usefulness through sale, exchange and gift. A large number of duplicate casts, to serve for study, exhibition or exchange, can be made from a glue mold A NOTE ON POISONOUS SNAKES By Mary Cynthia Dickerson A snake group recently put on view in the reptile exhibit of the second floor represents asmall part of a South Carolina swamp with its logs and stumps, vines and water hyacinths, the last of interest because often an obstruction to navigation in southern rivers. The group shows side by side poisonous snakes, the water moccasin (Ancistrodon piscivorus) and non-poisonous, the brown water snake (Natrix tazispilotus). It also exemplifies the vivipa- rous type of snake, the brood of sixty representing the offspring of one of the water snakes. T would be fortunate if there were some certain rule for distinguishing a poisonous from a non-poisonous snake. That the non-poisonous has large scales on the head is not an infallible guide since the cobras and their allies are quite as innocent looking; that the poisonous has usually a triangular head distinct from the neck is again untrustworthy as many harmless species, like the water snakes, when under the influence of fear, inflate the sides of the head to a semblance of concealed poison glands. Neither does an antagonistic manner tell much because certain harmless forms, like the hog-nosed snakes, so-called “spreading adders ’’, are aggres- sive in a higher degree than many deadly species. This lack of distinction is not, for North America at least, the grave misfortune it would seem however, for there has been exaggeration in the popular mind as to the number of poisonous species. In India to be sure, 30 POISONOUS SNAKES ol where people go with bare feet and legs through the jungle, the time has been when mortality from snake bite reached twenty thousand annually. This was before the discovery of antivenin, a serum prepared in the same way as germ disease antitoxins and now for sale in India, as in other coun- tries where branches of the Pasteur Institute have been established. As early as 1887 experiments proved that repeated inoculations of snake venom put an animal into a condition resistant to the venom, but not until 1894 was a serum dispensed for practical use. In North America accident from snake bite has always been a rare happening, the dangerous species being few — namely, two moccasins, the copperhead and the cottonmouth (Ancistrodon), two coral snakes (Elaps), small brilliantly colored allies of the cobras, and thirteen rattlesnakes (Sistrurus and Crotalus). With the exception of the coral snakes, these are all “pit vipers” and can be recognized when seen near at hand by a peculiar deep depression, of questioned function, between the eye and the nostril and also by a vertical pupil. But for snakes in general the venomous species is marked by no peculiar structure except the poison apparatus itself, and many non-poisonous snakes even possess the poison glands ina primitive stage of development, lacking only the poison-conducting fang. Therefore in North America where out of about one hundred and ten species only seventeen are dangerous to man, and of these not often more than two occur in a given district, the problem of safety even for extended expeditions into the wilderness demands merely a knowledge of the appear- ance of the few given forms. Portion of a new snake group that gives acquaintance with the deadly water moccasin of the South [the snake in the foreground; wax cast by James C. Bell, color work by Frederick H. Stoll] XTINCT WEAVING WHICH CANNOT BE IMITATED BY MACHINERY Old Saltillo serapes have a beauty f Persia and India and comparable with fine old mummy- MEXICAN SERAPE REPRESENTING E The pattern is in two colors of indigo on a tan-colored ground. of color and design rivaling the fabrics o cloths of Peru 32 THE ANSON W. HARD COLLECTION OF SALTILLO AND CHIMAYO BLANKETS displayed at the northern end of the hall devoted to the Indians of the Southwest. The exhibit consists of twenty-five Chimayo and Saltillo blankets known as Mexican “zarapes” or “serapes,” purchased for the Museum by Anson W. Hard in 1910. The weaving represented in these blankets is now extinct and there is no way by which it can be imi- tated exactly by machinery. Fine examples of the blankets are difficult to obtain having received practically no attention from museums and collectors, probably because thought until recently of Spanish origin instead of Indian. It is well-known that the Navajo are the only extensive blanket-weaving Indians of North America to-day. It is believed however, that if the full story of weaving in this country prior to the coming of the white man were known, we should find that the art was widespread through eastern, south- ern, middle and western North America. This is thought to be the fact not from the existence of samples of this weaving but from the evidence of impressions of patterns of weaving on pottery preserved in these regions, and from the relationships of the various North American tribes. Textiles cannot long survive in a moist changing climate. It is only in dry regions such as the Southwest and the coastal parts of Peru that delicate fabrics could have been preserved. Throughout Mexico serapes were formerly much worn as ponchos or simply carried over the shoulder. The great market for them was the town of Saltillo in northern Mexico. Chimayo blankets made by Chimayo Indians of northern New Mexico, who are now practically extinct, are thought to be the connecting link between Navajo and Saltillo weaving. a very wonderful examples of American aboriginal weaving are Four types of blanket weaving have been known — namely, among the people of Peru, the Pueblos of New Mexico, heirs to the art of the Cliff Dwellers, the Navajo of Arizona and New Mexico, and the Indians of Alaska. Little has been known of the textile art between Peru and the more northerly centers. It is fortunate therefore that these examples of aboriginal weaving . from Saltillo have come into the possession of the Museum. Saltillo blankets are large, often measuring seven by ten feet, and show very minute patterns for North American hand weaving. They are often covered with a delicate tracery of design made by the combination of small figures in harmonizing shades, although a few of the blankets have 33 Small section of a red serape with an unusually effective design carried out in white, light yellow, rose, indigo, green and black bolder designs in more contrasting colors. Most of them present a splendid diamond medallion of concentric design in the center while the border develops delicate patterns, usually minute geometric motives. San Miguel blankets differ from the Saltillo in having a rosette medallion. The colors are fast and while brilliant are harmonious in their combinations. Some of the blankets are red in tone with the designs carried out in shades of green, blue and yellow, while other very beautiful specimens consist of two or three shades of blue in combination with white only or with white and brown. Although not so prized as the finest Navajo nor at present carrying so high a money value, some of these blankets have a beauty of color and design which makes them rival the work of Persia and India. In fact they are among the finest examples of weaving to be found in any country or in any age and should be compared with fine old mummy cloths and other pre- Columbian textiles of Peru. ’ 4400000000000000000004 oS <_ > — = _> >< = = a> > = > > > > = Small section of a beautiful serape of finest wool, thin and of light weight. The design is woven in two shades of indigo, with white, brown and black 34 MUSEUM NOTES SrncE the last issue of the JouRNAL the following persons have been elected to membership in the Museum: Life Members, Mrs. Cuarues L. BERNHEIMER, Mrs. CLEVELAND H. Dopcer, Mrs. D. Witus James, Miss D. GREER, Miss CAROLINE Con- sTANTIA Warp, Miss Atice DELANO WEEKs, and Messrs. SAM. SLOAN AvucutncLoss, S. A. GoLpDSCHMIDT, GEORGE GoRDON Kino, A. M. Post Mircnett, Witutram H. Moore, Roperr Rogers, C. RircHie SIMPKINs, Rosert E. Top, and ELtmore A. WILLETs; Sustaining Members, Messrs. Howarp Huntineton, SAMUEL Kraus, Jacos W. Mack and ALFRED NATHAN; Annual Members, Mr. and Mrs. Epwarp T. H. Tatmace, Mr. and Mrs. Cuas. GouvERNEUR WerR, Mrs. James Hoyr BENepict, Mrs. Jacos S. BERNHEIMER, Mrs. VirGintA Danziger, Mrs. Stuon FLEXNER, Mrs. Tueo. A. Koun, Mrs. H. A. Maynon, Mrs. Henry S. REpDMonp, Mrs. C. F. Street, Mrs. LIoneEL Sutro, Mrs. Ezra Riptey THAYER, Mrs. E. Van Raatte, Mrs. Jonun J. Watrersury, Miss Jesste M. BrINKLEY, Miss Anna E. Cuatres, Miss HELEN SEars, the Misses SCOFIELD, REv. Isaac S. Moses, and Messrs. Herman Beur, Wm. M. Bensamin, Max E. BERNHEIMER, SIDNEY BLUMENTHAL, ALEXANDER DeutscH, LupDWwIG Dreyruss, J. M. Ertswortn, ABRAHAM ERLANGER, KAUFMAN GEORGE Faux, Mosss J. Freunp, Wa. Top Hetmurtu, Jr., Morris J. Hrrscu, B. KAUFMANN, JuLIUS KAUFMANN, SAMUEL Knorr, EpHraim B. Levy, Juuius A. Lewisoun, C. M. Logs, J. Lozs, RopertT H. MAINzER, SAMUEL Maruer, Oscar MicHakt, SIMON MILLER, THEO. OBERMEYER, J. OPPEN- HEIM, Myron H. Oprennem, Z. H. OPPENHEIMER, Howarp PALMER, WM. Ross Procror, K. J. Ranson, Joun D. Reynoxps, Isaac L. Rice, Isaac RIEGELMAN, Simon R. Rrem, Huperr E. RocGers, Sou. G. ROSENBAUM, ALFRED S. Rossin, FRED. SAUTER, JR., J. Lous SCHAEFER, W. SCHALL, JR., Artuur L. Sevic, ALBERT J. SELIGSBERG, FRANCIS SMyTH, LEO STEIN, Natuan B. Stern, THEODORE STERNFELD, SYLVAN L. Strx, CHARLES Srrauss, JosepH Strroock, Bensamin Tuska, DonaALp SEYMouR TUTTLE, B. Urmann, L. A. Van Praac, Joun L. WrLkrieE and Bronson WINTHROP. Dr. Frepertc A. Lucas was made Corresponding Member of the Zoé- logical Society of London at its meeting of December 20. Mrs. IsaBELLE Fretp Jupson has succeeded to the patronship of the late Cyrus W. Field and Mr. Charles S$. Shepard to the patronship of the late Edward M. Shepard. Dr. Water B. James has been elected patron of the Museum in recog- nition of his contributions for the preparation of marine groups in the department of invertebrate zodlogy. 35 36 THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL ProFessoR GEORGE GRANT MacCurpy of Yale University spent part of the past month in the classification of the Museum’s collections from prehistoric Europe. An exhibit of this material is being arranged in the tower room of the North American archeological hall, second floor west. A SERIES of models of bacteria is under preparation by the department of public health. They will illustrate recent discoveries in the structure of these minute organisms, including all the more important bacterial enemies of man, such as the tubercle bacillus, the typhoid bacillus, the plague bacil- lus, and the spirillum of cholera, with killed and preserved colonies showing actual growth. The collection of living bacterial cultures has grown rapidly during the year. There are under cultivation 479 cultures, representing 322 different types, and forming what is probably the most complete collection of bac- teria in existence, with the single exception of the Kral collection at Vienna. Also 577 cultures have been sent out from the laboratory to fifty-three different institutions in the United States and Canada, representing a some- what unique service to American bacteriological teaching and research. Mr. N. C. Netson, instructor in anthropology in the University of California, has been appointed assistant curator in the department of anthropology. His best-known work has been the exploration of shell mounds on the California coast. He will assume his duties here next June and will give especial attention to North American archeology. Mr. Greorce Borup, who was in charge of the third supporting party of Admiral Peary in his last polar expedition, has been appointed assistant curator in the department of geology and invertebrate paleontology. Tue OrizaBa Hasitat Group, which it is hoped will be completed in January, promises to be one of the most attractive in the series of bird groups thus far made. It differs from the preceding groups in at- tempting to present an impression of the faunal character of the region it represents, rather than the home life of some particular species or colonial gathering of birds. The foreground therefore will contain characteristic species of birds of eastern tropical Mexico, while the background, with its view of snow-crowned Orizaba, is designed to give an impressive lesson in the distribution of life as controlled by altitude. This feature will be explained by a series of photographic transparencies introduced in the panels on either side of the group, and portraying the characteristic vegeta- tion from the tropical forests at the base of Orizaba, through the oaks of the temperate zone and the conifers of the Canadian zone, to its treeless summit above the limit of life. MUSEUM NOTES 37 Tuer year has closed with much work in progress, although many things are so hinged together that one cannot move without the other. For example, the section of the Big Tree in the Darwin hall has been waiting many years for a suitable place in the hall of forestry. The rearrangement of the forestry hall permits the removal of a case that provides room for the Big Tree, that in turn leaves room for the erection of a case to hold the domesticated dogs illustrating variation under domestication, and the removal of these permits a rearrangement of the mammals that will ulti- mately lead to the assembling of new bird groups. Similarly the removal of the groups of New York mammals to the hall of North American mammals permits the taking down of the large cases and provides a home for the exhibits of the department of public health and the closely related department of anatomy and physiology. At the same time the cases once containing the groups of mammals will be transferred to the African hall for the extension of that part of the collection. Mr. WALTER GRANGER, associate curator of fossil mammals, has been abroad since early November engaged in part upon researches among the fossil mammals of the English and French museums, especially the Old World relatives of the four-toed horse. Tue exhibit illustrating the evolution of the horse has been reinstalled and extended. It now displays upon a single panel the principal stages in the evolution in size and general proportions, in skull and feet, teeth, brain and limb-bones, all arranged in accordance with the successive geologic formations in which they are found. The panel is to the right of the en- trance of the mammal hall. The Amblypoda, gigantic quadrupeds of the early Tertiary Period are being reinstalled upon the panel system at the opposite end of the hall. Other recent additions to the fossil vertebrate collections are the Fort Lee reptile and the skeleton of a smaller relative, the Rutiodon, from the coal fields of North Carolina, displayed in the corridor opposite the elevator; and in the quaternary hall, skeletons (casts) of the extinct South American quadrupeds Macrauchenia and To.xo- don, with a number of small models illustrating the extinct animals of the Quaternary Period in South America. Dr. Wituram H. Homes, curator-in-chief of the anthropological division of the National Museum, visited the Museum December 19 to view the North American archeological collections. Dr. Holmes is gen- erally recognized as the leading archeologist in America. ProFEssoR CHARLES-EpwarD Amory WINSLow will represent the American Museum of Natural History at the forthcoming International 38 THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL Congress of Hygiene and Demography to be held in New York September, 1912. THe Executive Committee has created the office of assistant librarian and has appointed Miss Ida Richardson Hood to fill the position. THE COLOMBIAN EXPEDITION has thus far sent collections of birds and mammals numbering between three and four thousand specimens, which prove to be exceptionally rich in species new to the Museum collection as well as new to science. Preliminary study of the birds, for example, shows that the wrens and thrushes are represented by eighteen species and sub- species all of which are practically unknown to the Museum collection, while several appear not to have been described. The single family of flycatchers further illustrates the richness of the avifauna of the region in question, the collection containing no less than fifty-nine representatives of this family, or nearly twice as many as are found in America north of Mexico. Mr. J. Prerpont MorGan has presented to the gem hall a small but very interesting and valuable collection. It consists of large crystals of beni- toite — the beautiful new gem stone of California, a double colored polished beryl section, a euclase crystal associated with yellow topaz, and three remarkable tourmalines from Madagascar. ‘The most prominent specimen is a really wonderful mass of aquamarine weighing thirteen pounds, which is only a small portion of a crystal that weighed 246 pounds. It is decep- tively like glass, possessing a perfect texture, and having the typical and always fascinating aquamarine tint, delicately blue with interior greenish reflections. AmonG the groups in preparation for the Darwin hall is one illustrating the complex relations of animals to one another and to man, which it is hoped will be on exhibition within a few months. A museum has been likened to an iceberg seven-eighths of which, so far as the public is concerned is not in view. The visitor sees the finished product; he does not see the varied steps that lead up to it from collection in the field through the work of preparation. The public reads with interest of extended explora- tion in Colombia, of fossil hunting in Alberta: a year, or two years after- ward appears a note or an article to the effect that such a group or such a specimen has just been placed on exhibition. Even the visitor to the workrooms cannot realize how long and tedious much of the preparation really is nor the pains necessary to secure seemingly simple results. Dr. P. E. Gopparp, associate curator of anthropology, has just returned from the Southwest. About a month was spent on the Kiowa-Comanche MUSEUM NOTES 39 reservation in the region of Anadarko, Oklahoma. A fairly representative collection, which included a number of excellent buckskin garments and ceremonial objects of interest, was obtained from the Kiowa-Apache and Kiowa. FOR THE PEOPLE FOR EDVCATION | FOR SCIENCE ELEPHANT HUNTING IN EQUATORIAL AFRICA ; DOLLAR PER YEAR FIFTEEN CENTS PER COPY American Museum of Natural History Seventy-seventh Street and Central Park West, New York City BOARD OF TRUSTEES President Heney Farrrvtetp Ossorn First Vice-President Second Vice-President CLEVELAND H. DopGE J. PrerPONT MORGAN, JR. Treasurer Secretary CHARLES LANIER ArcHEeR M. ILUNTINGTON THe Mayor or THE City or New York THE COMPTROLLER OF THE City oF NEW YorRK THE PRESIDENT OF THE DEPARTMENT OF PARKS ALBERT S. BICKMORE A. D. JUILLIARD GerorGE S. BowpDorIn Gustav E. Kisser * JoserpH H. CHoatTE Seta Low Tuomas DEWITT CUYLER OcpEN MILus JaMES DouGLas J. PrzeRPONT MorGan Mapison GRANT Percy R. PYNE Anson W. Harp WILLIAM ROCKEFELLER ADRIAN ISELIN, JR. JoHn B. TREVOR ARTHUR CURTISS JAMES Fevrx M. WarsBura Water RB. JAMES GrorcGE W. WICKERSHAM EXECUTIVE OFFICERS . Director Assistant Secretary Freperic A. Lucas GEORGE H. SHERWOOD Assistant Treasurer Tue UnitTep Srates Trust Company or NEw York * Deceased Tue Museum 1s Oren FREE TO THE PuBLIC ON Every Day IN THE YEAR. THe AMERICAN Musrum or NATURAL History was established in 1869 to promote the Natural Sciences and to diffuse a general knowledge of them among the people, and it is in cordial coéperation with all similar institutions throughout the world. The Museum authorities are de- pendent upon private subscriptions and the dues from members for procuring needed additions to the collections and for carrying on explorations in America and other parts of the world. The membership fees are, Annual Members. ).¢scriee tas ote eters $ 10 HILO WS seisscscetn. tees as.c pia eed aes $ 500 Sustaining Members (Annual)... ... 25 IPACLONS ie w.oie 2a ee re ne 1000 Tife Members stro set «ks cleus bear re a ess 100 Benefactors (Gift or bequest) 50,000 Tue Museum LIBRARY contains more than 60,000 volumes with a good working collection of publications issued by scientific institutions and societies in this country and abroad. The library is open to the public for reference daily — Sundays and holidays excepted — from 9 a. m. to 5 P. M. Tue Museum PUBLICATIONS are issued in six series: The American Museum Journal, Annual Report, Anthropological Papers, Bulletins, Guide Leaflets and Memoirs. Information concerning their sale may be obtained at the Museum Library. GurpEs ror Stupy or ExuIBITs are provided on request by the Department of Public Education. Teachers wishing to bring classes should write or telephone the Department for an appointment, specifying the collection to be studied. Lectures to classes may also be arranged for. In all cases the best results are obtained with small groups of children. WoRKROOMS AND STORAGE COLLECTIONS may be visited by persons presenting membership tickets. The storage collections are open to all persons desiring to examine specimens for special study. Applications should be made at the information desk. Tue Mitita RESTAURANT in the east basement is reached by the elevator and is open from 12 to 5 on all days except Sundays. Afternoon Tea is served from 2 to 5. The Mitla Room is of unusual interest as an exhibition hall being an exact reproduction of temple ruins at Mitla, Mexico. The American Museum Journal CONTENTS FOR FEBRUARY, 1912 Frontispiece, In the Forests of Uganda Elephant Hunting in Equatorial Africa........ CarRL E. AKELEY The story of a search for an old elephant with large ivory to stand in the American Museum as a record specimen when the African species shall have become extinct. With photographs taken in the elephant country of British East Africa and Uganda Brae, HOCK hel bers... 0 May. os owen) ok te Max ScHRABISCH meotory. ol Decorative Arty... o0. 20 056s42.05-- CLARK WISSLER aes ide ools: of Nahant: 2.0) 0.0 2. $. 030 Roy W. MINER An Expedition to the Black Mountains. ... WimLLtrAM BEUTENMULLER In Dominica and Other Lesser Antilles... ... Henry E. CRamMpTon BCIKE TT JAMNRICA. 2 .-.< 2 das 25. oe ewe oe ah (ae anes narican. 4 . ’ Ped . A a ~ ESKIMO OF THE BLOND TYPE Prince Albert Sound, May, 1911. These Eskimo differ in general features from Eskimo of Alaska and Mackenzie River. Some have blue eyes and fifty per cent have light eyebrows; a few have reddish beards. The expedition obtained physical measurements of 206 Coro- nation Gulf Eskimo. The characteristics of these people seem to suggest a mixture of European and Eskimo blood were people who accepted gifts. In Nome, Alaska, a prominent lawyer told me a story which puts the contrast definitely. He had a suit of clothes that he had made up his mind to throw away, although they 201 Stefansson’s party hauling a seal to shore. The party averaged seven Eskimo, four. of these seven remaining with the expedition the entire four years. Among these four were Tlavinirk, his wife, Mamayauk, and their daughter, Nogosak. [Mamayauk is shown in the photograph at the extreme right] were still in good condition. One day an Eskimo passed his door and it struck the lawyer that the suit of clothes would just about fit that particular man, so he called him in, dressed him from head to foot in clothes better than most Eskimo can afford — gave him shoes, a hat and everything else necessary to make him presentable. The Eskimo took all this as a matter of course, expressing neither gratitude nor pleasure, and when he saw that he was going to get nothing more, he pulled out an ivory toothpick and tried to sell it to the lawyer for ten cents. The story is typical of the entire Alaska and Mackenzie district; the indiscriminate charities of whalers and missionaries alike have thor- oughly pauperized the Es- kimo. It seems strange that while we fully realize the danger of pauperizing the slums of New York, there seems to occur to no one the possibility that the heathen as well as the hoodlum may be injured by too much kindness. You may be able to sterilize out of the old clothes boxes the germs of tuberculosis, Young Nogosak, daughter of Mamayauk, with ° her older adopted brother. The latter was a valuable typhoid and measles, but you member of the expedition for three years 202 cannot sterilize out of them the germs of thriftlessness and laziness, the germs of pauperism, that take root wherever men learn that a whine will go farther than a month’s honest work toward dressing themselves and their families. Captain Amundsen closes his chapter on the Eskimo of King William Island with a significant sentence: “My best wish for my friends the Netchilik Eskimo is that civ- ilization may never get to them.” It is the wish of a true friend, but a vain wish unfortunately. We cannot stop the onslaughts of civil- ization upon the Eskimo any more than the Red Cross can stop war, but like the Red Cross we can work for the amelioration of a brutal system. The mission boards, by taking thought, can add a cubit to the average intellec- tual stature of the men who are doing their field work among the heathen; bv tak- Mamayauk, member of the expedition for four : 5 F years. A civilized Eskimo of the Mackenzie River ing thought they can devise ‘}a:iy1 systems which will yield them better spiritual harvests than they are now gathering, and manifold the present almost negligible contribution they are making toward the bodily welfare of the Eskimo. They should place the commandments of sanitation on a par with those of Sinai. The governments of Alaska and of Canada should follow the Danish government of Greenland in trying to protect the Eskimo against epidemics, pauperization and commercial exploitation. Lastly, those of us who are in the habit of contributing our spare pennies toward the carrying of light to the dark places of the earth should inquire as to the local suitability of our illuminating systems in the places where they are to be used. After all, the Eskimo have the sun, moon, stars, and aurora. 203 JojUIM SuTUIOD oY} JOJ Poos opfAosd 07 noq{1ed Joy yosees oY, “Punosy oe ey} UO [oAe14 JouIUINE tlossunfarg “A Mq ‘ee ‘14O24Adop TIGL ‘Qsnsny ‘Asievgq ode wou puvyul ‘punoiy) Uosieg oY} UO 9uaos SUTUIOW WY ‘SsOp pue UU 1OJ speopypoed oy} sUuISsUuRIIY uossuvfajgy “A fig ‘eTé6T qybrihdo STEFANSSON’S DISCOVERIES — A TENTATIVE SUMMARY OF RESULTS By Clark Wissler HE anthropological results of the Stefansson-Anderson expedition may ‘| be tentatively summarized, although an authoritative statement cannot be made until the collections have arrived and have been given careful consideration and comparison with those from other regions. The region between Cape Bathurst and King William Island was formerly so little known that one could do no more than conjecture as to what groups of Eskimo lived therein. Mr. Stefansson succeeded in visiting thirteen groups in that territory and determining approximately their respective habitats. This alone marks an important advance in our knowledge of the Eskimo. Moreover some data as to the culture, language, and somatology of each group were re- corded. This, in comparison with data on the Central and Alaskan Eskimo should give us a fair idea of the whole gamut of Eskimo culture from Green- land to the Aleutian Islands. When it is recalled that anthropologists have found some important differences between the culture of the Alaskan Eskimo and of those around Hudson Bay, it must follow that a boundary line or a transitional belt exists somewhere in the region visited by Stefansson and Anderson. The data will give at least a tentative solution of this problem. As to the past history of the Eskimo, we must appeal to what is in the ground. The expedition noted many ruins of former villages and recorded the character of houses and culture for further study. A point of especial interest is, that from Cape Parry we have a collection of pottery dug up out of the cutbank. Mr. Stefdnsson says this pottery is of the Point Barrow type. This one fact is of considerable importance since it greatly extends the pottery area among the Eskimo. Other archeological material was secured from the vicinity of Point Barrow and a comparative study of these two collections, one east of the Mackenzie and one west, will prove of great importance. It appears now that these collections supplemented by other historical data will enable Mr. Stefansson to demonstrate that the introduction of fish nets, labrets and tobacco pipes was comparatively recent and from the west, whereas pottery was known a long time before, in fact at Point Barrow he reports it as occurring in the oldest known remains of the Eskimo. Lastly, we may mention the peculiar suggestions of European blood among these Eskimo. This is an interesting somatological discovery. We say traces of European blood because that seems the most reasonable explanation of the observed facts. If a tendency toward blond hair only occurred, the possibility of variation within the group might be granted but 205 206 THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL since some blondish hair was also curly and associated with eyes of a bluish cast, we have at least three characters peculiar in association to European peoples. That the presence of all in association among a group of Eskimo could be attributed to accidental variation is almost inconceiv- able. Consequently Mr. Stefansson has brought forward as the most reasonable explanation, the theory that the observed admixture is the result of intermarriage with the early Scandinavian colonists in Greenland. No more definite conclusion can now be formed. While most of the mixed groups had never been visited, explorers had from time to time heard native accounts of them, and as Mr. Stefansson says, on Franklin’s expedition, one lone Eskimo was encountered in the same locality, an old man with European features and an exceptionally long white beard. If the char- acters are due to mixture, the infusion must have occurred several hundred years ago and although we may never know precisely how the foreign blood was introduced, a complete record of facts will nevertheless be of interest. We hope that Mr. Stefansson may continue his investigation to determine the relative distribution of European characters among these Eskimo groups. Copyright, 1912, by V. Stefansson Summer hunting lodge of spruce boughs, Horton River, about ten miles from the Arctic coast, September, 1911 The whaling station at Ulsan, Korea, A transport is ready to carry whale flesh and blubber to the Japanese markets AN EXPEDITION IN KOREA THE CALIFORNIA GRAY WHALE, SUPPOSED BY MANY NATURALISTS, TO BE EXTINCT, REDISCOVERED IN KOREAN WATERS By Roy C. Andrews With Photographs by the Author HE American Museum sent an expedition to Korea in 1911 primarily to complete the study and collection of the Japanese whales upon which work had been begun in 1910; secondarily to make a zoological and geographical exploration of the country lying between the Tumen and Yalu rivers along the northeastern Korean boundary.! On the previous expedition skeletons of all the large species except the humpback and California gray whales had been secured. It was especially desirable to acquire specimens of the latter because the “devilfish,” as it is often called, was believed by many naturalists to be extinct and no complete specimen existed in any of the museums of Europe or America. Moreover, the California gray whale is of especial importance to systematists since it apparently represents an intermediate stage between the two great families of whalebone whales, the Baleenopteride and the Balenide. For many years this species was the object of a desultory pursuit by whalemen along the southern California coast where it appeared on its annual migrations, but its numbers decreased until it was no longer 1The account of the exploration of northern Korea is held in reserve for a later issue of the Journau.— Editor. 207 802 eATIOUTYSIP st seddrpy omy Jo edeyseu,L « GOTT OTVT A ,, poled suvsoejsnid [jews Ayotyo ‘soqiseried Aq poonpoad oJoM sJsddiyp pure ssulbpiem AVIS OISLIajOVIeYyO sey Apo vy} pue IeTNIed SI {Ie} IO ,,SoyNG,, pvoy 649 UO SSULyIeM agIVM OU, ‘al[V@yM AVIS eIUIOJTVO e& dn SsuygnpD sy Jo odeys oY, ‘JaeyM 949 02 Z[VYM AVIS eIUIOTVO B SulNeA Bringing in a finback whale at Ulsan, Korea. A ‘‘whale spade’’ is being used to cut the harpoon rope commercially profitable and the hunt was abandoned. This was in the early seventy’s; since then the gray whale has been lost to science. While in Japan in 1910, I heard reports from the Oriental Whaling Company that a whale called the devilfish, constituted the basis of their fishery on the Korean shores during the months of December and January. I was tremendously interested in this for it seemed that possibly here was to be an opportunity of rediscovering the gray whale. At that time it was impossible to visit the Korean stations because it was already the middle of February when I arrived in Japan from a long cruise south of the equator, but after the success of 1910 it seemed to be of paramount importance to investigate the gray whale fishery. The Oriental Whaling Company at once invited the Museum to con- tinue the work of the preceding season and agreed to render all assistance in its power for accomplishing the desired work. The company had al- ready presented to the Museum skeletons of six large whales and ten por- poises which had been taken during the year 1910. The courtesies of its stations and ships had been freely extended and every help rendered in securing for us specimens of the whales desired. It was therefore ex- ceedingly liberal in the president and directors of the company to continue to give their support and was indicative of the true scientific spirit with which the Japanese nation is inspired. 209 210 THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL When I arrived in the Orient at the beginning of 1912, everything had been prepared for my reception. I left Japan immediately upon one of the company’s transports for the Korean station, situated in a beautiful bay at Ulsan, on the east coast forty miles north of Fusan. The next day I had my first view of the California gray whale, for a splendid specimen was brought in by the steamship “Olga Maru.” I shall never forget the ex- citement with which I examined the extraordinary animal and studied the skeleton as it was stripped of flesh. The resemblance to a right whale, the typical representative of the Balzenide, is striking, and yet an examination of the bones shows many characters allying it to the fin whales of the Bale- nopteridxe. It was especially interesting to examine the specimen with reference to the accounts of the species which have already been published, for all are meagre and full of inaccuracies. Probably no whale has more individual peculiarities than has this species: the shape of the head, of flippers and flukes, and in fact of the entire body is quite unlike that of any other large cetacean. Its habits too are distinctly individual. About the middle of December the animals begin to appear on the coast of central Korea, following the shore line closely on their migration to the islands of the south. First come a few straggling males, then the main body of females, and later males alone bringing up the rear. Almost all of the females are carrying young, soon to be born, and they head for the quiet waters among the many islands of south Korea where the birth takes place. In April the young are large enough to travel northward and accompany their parents on the long trip to the Okhotsk Sea and the icebound shores of the Arctic. While the ship is following a devilfish the animal will sometimes come to the surface very slowly and quiet- ly, put just the nostrils above the water and blow so softly that no column of vapor is formed. It will then sink noiselessly with- out having shown more than eighteen or twenty inches of its body above the sur- face. It will also swim along the shore, Throat of a gray whale showing the two characteristic often actually rolling furrows. Right whales have no throat grooves and fin in the surf, so close whales have many; the gray whale is apparently an inter- 3 mediate stage between the two families that the ship cannot A very white humpback whale in a position to show throat, breast and flippers. markings on the throat are probably caused by barnacles, masses of which are seen adhering to the folds and on the edges of the fins The circular Humpback whale [right fin and breast in view, lower photograph! secured for the Korean expedition. It measured 48 ft., 8 in. in length. quarter of the length of the entire body the Museum on The fins in this species are nearly one 211 THE HARPOON GUN The harpoon weighs 110 pounds. Powder in the hollow point is ignited by a time fuse. [forty fathoms of rope give slack to be carried with the harpoon in its flight. If the iron is well placed the whale is killed almost instantly A KILLER WHALE SECURED FOR THE MUSEUM Killer whales wage a continual warfare upon the gray whales. They were seen to force open the mouths of the living gray whales and eat the tongue, sometimes killing and completely devouring their prey 212 AN EXPEDITION IN KOREA 213 follow; it will even slide in behind rocks and try to hide, until the men on the vessel have become tired of waiting and leave. Gray whales live in perpetual terror of the killer whale which seems to single out this species especially for attacks. When a herd of killer whales surround a devilfish, the latter will often turn upon its back, the fins extended, and lie quietly at the surface seemingly paralyzed by fear. The killers force open the mouth and at times eat almost the entire tongue before the gray whale escapes; or the animal may even be killed, and completely devoured. I had always been skeptical as to just how much truth lies in the story that the killers really try to eat the tongues of living whales; it has been recorded in almost every account relating to the Orcas, but I had always considered it extremely improbable. After witnessing it in the case of the California gray whales however, my doubts entirely disappeared. One fine skeleton was taken for the Museum and a second, by arrange- ment, for the National Museum at Washington. Many photographs also were secured (the only ones in existence of this species), together with much alcoholic material, and three rolls of motion-picture films, besides notes and measurements of the thirty individuals which were taken during my stay at Ulsan. We wished to get also the skeleton of a humpback whale. Although humpbacks are common in many parts of the world, they have been so persistently hunted in Japan, that they are now extremely rare. The humpback furnishes the most highly esteemed food of all the whales and in the Japanese markets the flesh of a single individual brings as much as 5000 yen ($2500). February came and I had almost despaired of getting a humpback in Korea, for only one had been taken during the entire season. On the thirteenth of the month however, three specimens were brought in and the skeleton of the largest was preserved, a male forty-eight and a half feet long; the Museum is fortunate in securing such a splendid repre- sentative of this aberrant species. As soon as the bones had been cleaned and crated, I chartered a schooner and sent the whale skeletons to Shimo- noseki for trans-shipment to New York. This material makes the Museum’s collection of large cetaceans the most complete in the world. It lacks only the great “bowhead” of the Arctic and it is to be hoped that funds to secure a skeleton of this extraordinary mammal will soon be forthcoming. 214 THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL Candelaria == Florid. 0 Elevation in feet. 77° West of Greenwich MAP OF WESTERN COLOMBIA Drawn under the direction of Frank M. Chapman, mainly from R. Blake White’s map (1883) and from data gained by the Colombian expedition The dotted red lines show the route of the Colombian expedition. Names underscored with red indicate localities where collections, aggregating more than 7000 specimens, have been made for the Museum : FIELD WORK IN COLOMBIA NEW BIRD COLLECTIONS BEAR DIRECTLY ON THE PROBLEM OF THE ORIGIN AND DISTRIBUTION OF BIRD LIFE IN TROPICAL AMERICA — MATERIAL OB- TAINED FOR A HABITAT GROUP OF THE FAMOUS “ COCK-OF-THE-ROCK”” ! By Frank M, Chapman HE last report? published of the work of the Colombian expedition dp left Messrs. Allen and Miller, with their native assistants, in the Quindio region of the Central Andes, where collections of birds and mammals had been made up to the lower limit of perpetual snow, at an altitude of about 15,000 feet. Im November, 1911, they returned to the Cauca Valley to explore the primitive forests which exist in the vicinity of Rio Frio, and the collections made here supply important data on the origin of the life of the valley. Early in December a start was made from Cartago, in the Cauca Valley, toward Névita on the Rio San Juan, west of the coastal Andes. Supplies and outfit were transported on oxen for the first two days but for the remaining six, Indian carriers were employed, the trail being impassable for either mulesoroxen. Rain fell almost constantly during this journey and while the party was in the San Juan region, nevertheless many specimens new to the Museum and others new to science were secured, the fauna of the west side of the Coast Range being totally different from that found on its eastern side. The return to headquarters at Cali was made by way of Buenaventura and at this time the expedition was greatly assisted by Mr. D. C. Stapleton, a fellow of the Museum, whom the expedition fortunately encountered and who transported the men and their outfit to Buenaventura on his launch. Exposure to the unhealthful conditions which prevail in the coast region resulted in both Messrs. Allen and Miller falling victims to severe attacks of fever, and the month of January was passed in Cali where medical at- tendance could be secured. In March they were sufficiently recovered to resume exploration along lines previously planned, and they left Cali for Popayan en route for the headwaters of the Magdalena. As is shown in the accompanying map, this zodlogically little-known part of South America was reached by way of Almaguer over a foot-trail through a region difficult of passage but of great interest. After no little hardship San Agustin was reached early in April and here Mr. Allen, whose fever had returned with increased severity, was obliged to leave for Bogota for treatment and was subsequently sent back to America, while Mr. Miller, who had planned to return home for a well-earned vacation, decided to remain alone and explore the most promising field the expedition had thus far entered. 1 The cock-of-the-rock of the genus Rupicola is about the size of a partridge. Well- known to former explorers, the species has been locally destroyed because of the high decorative value of its flame-colored plumage. Mr. Leo E. Miller has found the bird in the wilds of the Naranjos River. 2 Am. Mos. Journat, Dec., 1911, pp. 295-298. 215 He first turned his attention to the upper branches of the Rio Mag- dalena and among other valuable specimens, — se- cured one of the chief desiderata of the expedi- tion, the heretofore almost unknown nest of the cock- of-the-rock, with studies on which to base a group of this remarkable bird. Concerning his discovery Mr. Miller wrote from San Agustin under date of May 6: Since I have been alone, the work has been pushed along as usual, and we have not been altogether unsuccessful. The best work was probably done in the wilds on the Rio Naranjos. Here I found the cock-of-the- rock in considerable numbers and had great hopes of finding a nest. Search as I would, in the most likely places, nothing re- sulted but an old root-lined mud nest, resembling a phoebe’s, but much larger. This of course did not amount to anything as there was no way of identifying it for certain. The Naranjos and its affluents are flanked by great, sheer cliffs, and as the birds that were examined were breeding LEO E. MILLER, COLLECTOR, IN COLOMBIA (all males) I knew there must He has succeeded in getting material for a Museum be nests somewhere. I recalled habitat group of the famous ‘‘cock-of-the-rock”’ how eager you were to get this nest, and that acted as a stimu- lus for further search. To make a long story short, I took seven fine nests in all: the old one, one with two eggs, two with one egg each, one with two very small young in very long down, one with one young with pin feathers and some down, and one with two young almost feathered; also, a series of males and females, in various plumages. The nests were all plastered against cliffs or rocks, but not high above the water; four, seven to fifteen feet, in the worst spots imaginable. To reach them it was necessary to build rafts, fell trees, and clamber down the stone walls secured with ropes. The females of nearly all the nests were collected. I have made as complete notes as possible. The nests are made with a solid mud foundation and are lined with fine rootlets. The eggs are nearly as large as a crow’s, and marked very heavily with much the same coloring as those of the black vulture. With characteristic modesty Mr. Miller does not add what we have subsequently learned, that the raft he mentions overturned throwing him into a current so rapid that he narrowly escaped drowning. Early in June Mr. Miller left San Agustin and crossed the eastern Andes 216 THE MUSEUM’S FIELD WORK IN COLOMBIA 217 from Alta Mira in the Magdalena Valley, to Florencia in Caqueta, on the headwaters of Amazonian drainage. The inaccessibility of this region has made it one of the least-known parts of South America, but it can now be reached over a recently constructed government road. Thirty days were passed in the vast forests about Florencia, which is at an altitude of only six hundred feet. It was the height of the rainy season but in spite of the heat and excessive humidity, Mr. Miller collected and preserved some eight hundred birds and mammals, practically none of which are represented in our previous Colombian collections. Forty-five days were required for the journey to New York where Mr. Miller arrived September 9, after eighteen months of continuous field work. It is still too early to speak at length of the major results obtained by our work in Colombia, but it is obvious as study of the collections progresses, that we are in possession of data of high importance in its bearing not only on the origin of life in Colombia, but also on the origin of life in tropical America. Incidentally the expedition has secured a surprisingly large number of new and rare species. We have found, for example, that a cer- tain duck (Aythya nationi) previously known from only two specimens, is a common bird in the Cauca Valley, and our series of fifteen beautifully prepared skins enables us to show the close relationships of this bird with Aythya brunnea of South Africa. At least one-fourth of the birds collected were not before contained in our Museum and many of these are new to American museums, while of those new to science a beautiful little parrot from near the crest of the Central Andes proves to be a link connecting other forms of its group. It has been named Pionopsitta fuertesi, in honor of Louis Agassiz Fuertes, foremost painter of birds, and a member of the reconnaissance party which planned the Colombian expedition route. There are also two new ant-thrushes which have been named respectively Grallaria allent and Grallaria milleri, in honor of the men who have rendered the Museum such excellent service at no small personal risk; new creepers, flycatchers, wrens, thrushes, finches, warblers, grosbeaks and tanagers, whose discovery shows how rich is the field awaiting the zodlogical explorer in South America. We should not fail to explain that the success we have met with in Col- ombia has been due not to the energy of our own representatives alone, but in no small measure to the courtesy and codperation of the Colom- bians who, whether as officials or individuals, have invariably honored our calls for information and assistance, and have frequently extended hospitali- ties which greatly increased the efficiency of the expedition. Our plans for the future include a biological survey of the Bogota region, to be followed by explorations in that little-known territory to the east in which upper branches of both the Orinoco and the Amazon have their origin. CAVE MATERIAL FROM A MEXICAN MINE By Edmund Otis Hovey HE department of geology has received from Mr. Grant B. Schley, president of the El Potosi Mining Company, a series of remarkable specimens of calcite and aragonite (carbonates of lime) and selenite (sulphate of lime) from a cave in the company’s mine near the city of Chihuahua, Mexico. This cave consists of a series of chambers in massive limestone and was broken into in the course of ordinary mining opera- tions. ‘The rooms are on several levels and are of different heights, al- though there are none with ceilings very lofty. The calcite and aragonite show some most delicate tints — water white and snow white, rose, salmon color, light lemon and sulphur yellow. One of the chambers of the cave discovered in a mine near Chihuahua. Delicate and fantastic crystals from this cave are on exhibition in the hall of historic geology The selenite or gypsum occurs in transparent, colorless crystals and crystal- lized aggregates, and as thick mats of long slender crystals resting like glistening snow upon curiously distorted helictites of the carbonate of lime. Radiating arrow heads of calcite are grouped together in some of the speci- mens and blunt crystals in others, but the most showy group of all consists of slightly salmon-colored, double-pointed two-inch crystals of dogtooth spar forming a flat mass more than thirty inches across. Unfortunately for science and the public, the cave contains a large amount of valuable silver lead ore in its walls and floor and is now in process of demolition for the winning of the precious minerals. 218 NEW DINOSAURS FOR THE AMERICAN MUSEUM By W. D. Matthew OR the past three summers the Museum has had an expedition in Alberta, Canada, searching for dinosaurs in the Cretaceous forma- tions of the Red Deer River. This expedition in charge of Mr. Barnum Brown, associate curator of fossil reptiles, has secured a fine series of specimens including a number of more or less complete skeletons of dinosaurs, some of them new, others related to the Cretaceous dinosaurs of Wyoming and Montana. The collection is already large and will be doubled by the results of this season’s work; its preparation and study will not be completed for some time to come. The specimens of the following list have been placed on exhibition on the fourth floor in the case opposite the elevator. 1. Albertosaurus skull, hind limb and part of tail. This was a great carnivorous dino- saur related to the Tyrannosaurus and more distantly to the Allosaurus and intermediate between the two in size. 2. Small ceratopsian (new). This is related to the huge horned dinosaurs, but is quite a small animal. A fragmentary skeleton was secured of which the fore limb and tail have been placed on exhibition, the rest being very much broken up. 3. Crested dinosaur Sauralophus (new). A complete articulated skeleton, of which the skull and jaws are placed on exhibition. It is related to the duck-bill dinosaurs but had a crest along the back and a great bony spine at the back of the skull. 4. Skulls and end of tail of armored dinosaurs. These are perhaps the most remarkable of Mr. Brown’s discoveries. The whole body was covered with heavy armor-plates, consoli- dated on the skull and the tip of the tail into a solid bony mass. This group of dinosaurs has become known to science only within the last few years, chiefly through Mr. Brown’s explorations and studies. The specimens secured will probably enable us to restore the entire skeleton of the largest of the group, Ankylosaurus. The novel methods adopted by Mr. Brown to explore this formation were outlined by him in the JourNaAL for December, 1911. The friendly attitude of the Canadian Geological Survey, to whose field parties we owe our first knowledge of the fossil riches of this territory, has been of material assistance. A PEOPLE’S MUSEUM OF EUROPE By Walter Granger F the natural history museums of Europe there is one which should be of especial interest to members and friends of the American Museum, because in the relations existing between the museum and the public it seems more nearly to approach our own than any other institution of its kind. This is the Museum of the Senckenberg Natural History Society of Frankfurt-am-Main, Germany. In some respects it is unique among natural history museums. The American Museum, like the British Museum and our National Museum, has a two-fold object, scientific research and public instruction. University museums here and 219 220 THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL abroad are chiefly for research and the special instruction of students, but the Senckenberg Museum has for its chief object the instruction of the public in natural history, first by popular lectures given in properly arranged courses by members of the staff, second by carefully selected, well arranged and well labeled specimens in the exhibition halls. The Senckenberg Society is an old one, but their museum, in its present quarters, dates only from 1907. This new building embodies new ideas in the arrangement of exhibition halls, in lighting, in the construction of cases and in the equipment of its lecture halls and laboratories. In the exhibits unnecessary duplication is avoided and a strong effort is made to illustrate all of the more important and interesting groups of animal life by at least one choice example. For instance in the great central court is an original skeleton of the herbivorous dinosaur Diplodocus obtained from the American Museum through the late President Jesup, a skull of the horned dinosaur T'riceratops purchased from an American collector and the skeleton of the Whitfield mastodon obtained from this Museum. The Senckenberg Museum is also ambitious in the matter of habitat groups and already two very large and elaborate ones have been installed. One represents two phases of African mammalian life, the two groups of animals each dominated by an adult giraffe, being arranged on opposite sides of the case yet the whole being so blended as to present a single picture. The second group is of the Arctic regions and the animals include the walrus, polar bear. Arctic fox and hare. Frankfurt is famous for the civic pride displayed by its inhabitants and the museum is fortunate in having many wealthy friends who contribute generously toward its development. Perhaps the most interesting and unusual feature of this museum however, is the hearty and earnest codpera- tion of the public in the actual work of the museum. Many young men and women of the city, some of them students in science and all interested in natural history, come to the museum during free hours and may be seen scattered through the laboratories engaged in the preparation of specimens, in labeling, cataloging and arranging collections, in the preparation of charts as illustrations for the lectures, and in various kinds of work connected with a museum, under the supervision of the regular staff of course, and all without pay. In this manner the workers acquire much knowledge which could be gained in no other way and the museum obtains services for which it would otherwise be obliged to hire assistants. Both the directors of the museum and the public take particular pride in this codperation. It was gratifying to learn that the methods of exhibition and instruction in general in our Museum, through the agency of the JourNaL and the Guide Leaflets, are closely studied by the directors of the Frankfurt Museum, and it may be said in return that their splendid institution has many suggestions to offer to the American Museum and others. MUSEUM NOTES SrncE the last issue of the JourRNAL the following persons have been elected to membership in the Museum: Life Members, Messrs. CLARENCE H. Eaacte, C. H. Ruppock and JoHN G. WortH; ; Annual Members, BARONESS RAOUL DE GRAFFENRIED, Mrs. GORHAM Bacon, Mrs. WiuiiamM E. Bonn, Mrs. Grorcr W. BurietcH, Mrs. WIL- LIAM ALLEN BuTLer, Mrs. GEorGE E. Cut1so_tm, Mrs. SIpNEY J. JENNINGS, Mrs. Minnie A. McBarron, Mrs. Apram N. Stern, Mrs. JAMES R. Wauirtina, Mrs. C. R. Wooprn, Miss ANNA Bocert, Miss THEODATE Pope, Miss Mary F. Reuter, Rev. Francis Rout-WHEELER, Dr. E. B. Bronson, Dr. ErHan Fiace Butier, Dr. GEorGE W. CriLeE, Dr. FRANK OVERTON and Messrs. S. REEp ANTHONY, CLINTON T. BISSELL, GEORGE WHITEFIELD Buioop, STANLEY D. Brown, BELMORE BROWNE, FREDERICK H. CLARKE, EDWIN CorNING, EUGENE DELANO, Jr., Guy DU VAL, WILLIAM CROWNIN- SHIELD Enpicott, WILLIAM FLoyp, Jonn H. INMAN, WILLIAM ForRREST Keyes, ALBERT M. LILIENTHAL, EDwArRD LinpsEy, W. S. McCrea, M. Mack, W. N. McMiuuan, W. Forses Moraan, Jr., Joon M. Puincies, ALBERT HouGutTon Pratt, H. S. Purnam, GEorGE W. Rocers, MorGan R. Ross, BENJAMIN F.. SEAVER, Louts AGAssiz SHAW, THEODORE A. SIMON, CHARLES WILSON TaintTorR, Harry W. THEDFOoRD, J. V. VAN SANTVOORD, Freperick B. Van Vorst and AMAsA WALKER. PRESIDENT HENRY FAIRFIELD OsBoRN has just returned to the Museum from a tour through northern Italy, France and northwestern Spain. He visited several museums, including the Natural History Museum of Toulouse and the Musée Océanographique of Monaco, the latter forming the model for the new oceanographic hall of the American Museum. The chief feature of his journey was the inspection of Upper Palzolithic caverns, those of the Pyrenees with Professor Emile Cartailhac, of the Dordogne with L’Abbé Henri Breuil, and of northwestern Spain with Professor Hugo Obermaier. In the French caverns he was accompanied by Professor George G. MacCurdy of Yale University, who is representing the American Museum in the Paleolithic of Europe. At the invitation of Comte Begouen of Toulouse, President Osborn and Professor MacCurdy joined the first party to enter the newly discovered cavern known as Tuc d’Audoubert, which contains more than fifty drawings of the mammals of Upper Paleolithic times. In this tour all the principal caverns and stations of the Upper Paleolithic were visited, and through the courtesy of the leading French anthropologists who conducted these journeys important arrangements were made for the development of the American Museum collections. An archaic stone carving of the horse of Aurignacian age was secured for the Museum as well as a great collection of Paleolithic flints. 221 222 THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL THE Congo expedition under the leadership of Messrs. Lang and Chapin is again at a place where it can receive and send out letters, and the uneasi- ness felt by its friends and supporters in New York is relieved. The expedition reports from Faradje under date of July 27 that its field work is successfully completed and later under date of August 21 that the packing of equipment and collections is well under way for the start with caravan for Avakubi and thence out of Africa by the western coast. Drrector FrepErRIc A. Lucas was appointed by the Executive Com- mittee as a delegate of the American Museum to the meeting of the Museums Association of Great Britain which was held in Dublin, July 8 to 12. Dr. Lucas also represented the Museum at the laying of the corner stone of the new National Museum in Cardiff, Wales. He left New York on June 15 and spent more than two months studying the museums of London, Liver- pool, Edinburgh and other cities of the British Isles. Dr. Epmunp Ors Hovey, curator of geology and invertebrate paleeon- tology, served the Museum as acting director during the absence of Director Lucas. Dr. GEoRGE GRANT MacCurpy of Yale University was appointed the representative of the American Museum of Natural History at the eighth session of the Congrés Préhistorique de France at Angouléme, August 18 to 24. He was also appointed as the Museum’s delegate at the fourteenth session of the Congrés International d’Anthropologie et d’Archéologie Préhistoriques, held at Geneva the first week in September. Tue library has received as a gift from Mr. J. Pierpont Morgan an interesting manuscript by Richard Bliss, Jr. entitled Descriptions of New Species of Mauritian Fishes: this dates from 1875 and serves in part as letter-press for the volumes of unpublished drawings which the Museum acquired in 1905. Proressor HENRY FAIRFIELD OsBorn presented a dedicatory address, “The State Museum and State Progress,” at the opening of the New York State Education building, October 15. Mr. Anson W. Harp has again presented several very rare and valuable works in natural history to the library. Among them are the following: Monograph of the Coractide or Family of Rollers by H. E. Dresser (1893); Sammlung exotischer Schmetterlinge by J. Hiibner (8 volumes and 5 sup- plements, with manuscript index by Staudinger, 1806-1837); Etudes d’Entomologie by Charles Oberthiir (21 parts, 1876-1902), also Etudes de Lépidopterologie Comparée by Charles Oberthiir (1904-1911); Entomologie MUSEUM NOTES 223 ou Histoire Naturelle des Insectes by M. Olivier (8 volumes, 1789-1808); a set of Palacontographia Italia (16 volumes); The Birds of Tunisia by J. I. S. Whitaker (2 volumes). Dr. R. M. ANDERSON of the Stefansson—Anderson Arctic expedition is at present on board a whaler bound for San Francisco. He will reach New York in November bringing to the Museum important zodélogical collec- tions. Drrector FrepErIC A. Lucas as delegate represented the Museum at the dedication of the New York State Education building, October 17. Mempers of the Eighth International Congress of Applied Chemistry were the guests of the Museum on September 7. THE gift of back numbers of the JouRNAL to the files of the library will be appreciated by the Museum. Dourine the summer Dr. Clark Wissler has been carrying on archeologi- cal work among the Blackfoot and Dakota Indians of the Missouri River. TuHRouGH the generosity of Mr. Charles L. Bernheimer, a life member of the Museum, Mr. Andrews was able to purchase in Japan a mounted skin, a skeleton and two skulls of the oriental finless porpoise Neomeris phoce- noides (Cuvier). This cetacean is represented in but few collections of the world although not infrequently seen in Japanese waters. THE preliminary report by Frank M. Chapman on the bird collections received from the Colombian expedition has just been published in the Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History. It describes thirty- nine species new to science, and is accompanied by a map giving much new information on the region. Dr. CuEestTeR A. REEps, for four years instructor in geology at Bryn Mawr College, has been appointed assistant curator in the department of geology and invertebrate paleontology. He began his active duties on the first of August. Miss Mary C. Dickerson, assistant curator of herpetology, spent August in the field in southern Arizona where she secured a representative collection of the reptiles of the region and data on the relation of the reptile fauna to desert conditions for use in future group work. TuE localities in Victoria Land and the Coppermine region occupied by the Eskimo tribes discovered by the Stefansson-Anderson expedition have been indicated on the globe in the North Pacific hall. Also in the exhibition 224 THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL case at the right of the globe are displayed the clothing, weapons and other objects representative of the culture of these tribes [See back of cover]. These objects would tell in themselves, if there were no other evidence, that they come from a primitive, isolated people. They are unusually strong, having been made for use, not soon to be traded for knives or firearms, nor to be used mainly by the children of the tribe, as is the case when civilization is in process. Messrs. SPINDEN, LoWIE AND SKINNER of the department of anthro- pology have returned to the Museum from field research on the American Indian in North Dakota, Montana and Wisconsin respectively. Mr. C. W. Lene of the department of invertebrate zodlogy spent several weeks of the summer in Labrador and Newfoundland collecting insects for the Museum. Tue third annual exhibition of the Aquarium Society was held in the west assembly hall of the Museum October 6 to 13. Mr. Ropert C. Murpny is in charge of an expedition to the South Georgia Islands, under the joint auspices of the Museum of the Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences and the American Museum of Natural History. Mr. Wiitam B. RicHarpson returned to Colombia in July, to explore the exceedingly unhealthful Patia region, which appears not to have been visited before by a naturalist. THE MuseEvM is represented in the Chocé region of western Colombia by Mrs. Elizabeth Kerr, an American, who has recently sent a small col- lection of birds and mammals containing two new species of marmoset and several new birds. Unper the leadership of Dr. W.S. Rainsford, a third African expedition has been organized for the collection of the black rhinoceros and other large mammals. TuHE Museum’s public health models and diagrams illustrating the prob- lems of water supply and waste disposal and structure of the bacteria of disease were shown at the exhibition of the International Congress of Hygiene and Demography during September and were awarded the highest honor in each of the sections in which they were exhibited. The depart- ment of public health is at present engaged in the preparation of an exhibit dealing with insect-borne disease, one of the principal features of which will be a large and elaborate model of the common house-fly. DIRECTOR Freperic A. Lucas, Se.D. GEOLOGY AND INVERTEBRATE PALEONTOLOGY Epmunp Otis Hovey, Ph.D., Curator Cuester A. ReEeps, Ph.D., Assistant Curator MINERALOGY L. P. Graracap, A.M., Curator Georce F. Kunz, Ph.D., Honorary Curator of Gems INVERTEBRATE ZOOLOGY Henry E. Crampton, Ph.D., Curator Roy W. Miner, A.B., Assistant Curator Frank E. Lutz, Ph.D., Assistant Curator L. P. Graracap, A.M., Curator of Mollusca Joun A. GrossBeck, Assistant Wituram Morton WHEELER, Ph.D., Honorary Curator of Social Insects ALEXANDER PEeTRUNKEVITCH, Ph.D., Honorary Curator of Arachnida Aaron L. TREADWELL, Ph. DE, Honorary Curator of Annulata CuHarRLEs W. LENG, B. S., Honorary Curator of Coleoptera ICHTHYOLOGY AND HERPETOLOGY Basurorp Dean, Ph.D., Curator Louis Hussaxor, Ph.D., Associate Curator of Fishes Joun T. NICHOLS, AB., Assistant Curator of Recent Fishes Mary CYNTHIA DICKERSON, B.S., Assistant Curator of Herpetology MAMMALOGY AND ORNITHOLOGY J. A. AtLEN, Ph.D., Curator Frank M. Cuapman, Curator of Ornithology Roy C. Anprews, A.B., Assistant Curator of Mammalogy W. DeW. MILER, Assistant Curator of Ornithology VERTEBRATE PALHONTOLOGY HENRY Seneca Osgporn, Sc.D., LL.D., D.Sc., Curator Emeritus D. MATTHEW, Ph.D., Curator WALTER ary Associate Curator of Fossil Mammals Barnum Brown, A.B., Associate Curator of Fossil Reptiles Wituiam Kk. Grecory, Ph.D., Assistant Curator ANTHROPOLOGY Cuiark Wisster, Ph.D., Curator Purny E. Gopparp, Ph.D., Associate Curator Rosert H. Lowig, Ph.D., Assistant Curator Hersert J. SprinpEN, Ph.D., Assistant Curator Nets C. Netson, M. I.., Assistant Curator CuarLes W. Meap, Assistant Curator ALANSON SKINNER, Assistant Harwan I. Smits, Honorary Curator of Archeology ANATOMY AND PHYSIOLOGY Ratew W. Tower, Ph.D., Curator PUBLIC HEALTH Cuar.tes-Epwarp Amory WinsLow, M.S., Curator JoHN HENRY O'NEILL, 8.B., Assistant WOODS AND FORESTRY Mary Cyntuia Dickerson, B.S., Curator BOOKS AND PUBLICATIONS Ratrw W. Tower, Ph.D., Curator Ipa Ricuarpson Hoop, A.B., Assistant Librarian PUBLIC EDUCATION ALBERT S. Bickmore, Ph.D., LL.D., Curator Emeritus GrorcEe H. SHerwoop, A.M., Curator AanEs L. Roeser, Assistant 7 Bast!) $e 23 he i a hiner THE HUNTING WEAPONS OF THE “* NEW ESKIMO’? From the large and representative collection obtained by the Stefansson-Anderson expedition among the Coronation Gulf Eskimo—those Eskimo who show mixtures of blond hair, blue eyes, and other European features CR See <1 Ne, SO aren, ’ * a t a a Joe PO Mae So. fh RRS tr! eee American Museum of Natural History Seventy-seventh Street and Central Park West, New York City BOARD OF TRUSTEES President Henry FAIRFIELD OSBORN First Vice-President Second Vice-President CLEVELAND H. DopGE J. PrerPoNT Moraav, JR. Treasurer Secretary CHARLES LANIER ADRIAN ISELIN, JR. Tue Mayor or THe Ciry or New Yorxk THe COMPTROLLER OF THE City or NEw YorK THE PRESIDENT OF THE DEPARTMENT OF PARKS ALBERT S. BICKMORE A. D. JUILLIARD GEORGE S. BowDoIN Seta Low JosepH H. CHOATE OcgpEN MILLs Tuomas DeWitt CuyLeR J. Prerpont MorGan JAMES DouGLAs . Percy R. Pyne Mapison GRANT WILLIAM ROCKEFELLER Anson W. Harp JoHN B. TREVOR ARTHUR CURTISS JAMES Fevtrx M. WarsureG Watrer B. JAMES GrorGE W. WICKERSHAM EXECUTIVE OFFICERS Director Assistant Secretary Freperic A. Lucas GrorGE H. SHERWOOD Assistant Treasurer Tue Unirep States Trust Company or New YORK Tuer MUSEUM IS OPEN FREE TO THE PUBLIC ON EvERY Day IN THE YEAR. Tue AMERICAN Museum or NaturRAL History was established in 1869 to promote the Natural Sciences and to diffuse a general knowledge of them among the people, and it is in cordial coéperation with all similar institutions throughout the world. The Museum authorities are de- pendent upon private subscriptions and the dues from members for procuring needed additions to the collections and for carrying on explorations in America and other parts of the world. The membership fees are, VAMITHIAN) MGM DPS s/ers cis nievaragens: «re $ 10 MONO WS is,,&:roreiss ferns wet irae ett o eles RU $ 500 Sustaining Members (Annual)..... 25 PAtrOusi.. sascha Mew dese tet ee 1000 Life Members.......... ee ee 100 Associate Benefactors. .......... 10,000 Benefactors (gift or bequest) $50,000 Ture Museum LIBRARY contains more than 60,000 volumes with a good working collection of publications issued by scientific institutions and societies in this country and abroad. The library is open to the public for reference daily — Sundays and holidays excepted — from 9 a. Mm. to 5 Pp. M. Tur Museum PUBLICATIONS are issued in six series: American Museum Journal, Annual Report, Anthropological Papers, Bulletin, Guide Leuflets and Memoirs. Information concerning their sale may be obtained at the Museum library. Gurwes ror Stupy or EXHIBITS are provided on request by the department of public education. ‘Teachers wishing to bring classes should write or telephone the department for an appointment, specifying the collection to be studied. Lectures to classes may also be arranged for. In all cases the best results are obtained with small groups of children. WoRKROOMS AND STORAGE COLLECTIONS may be visited by persons presenting membership tickets. ‘The storage collections are open to all persons desiring to examine specimens for special ‘study. Applications should be made at the information desk. Tre M1trLa RESTAURANT in the east basement is reached by the elevator and is open from 12 to 5 on all days except Sundays. Afternoon Tea is served from 2 to 5. The Mitla room is of jinusual interest as an exhibition hall being an exact reproduction of temple ruins at Mitla, Mexico. The American Museum Journal CONTENTS FOR NOVEMBER, 1912 Frontispiece, A Living Lungfish, Photograph by Julius Kirschner.. 226 Present Condition of the California Bigtrees..GEoRGE B. SupwortH 227 Acreage of bigtree forests — Who owns them and guards them from fire — Where lumbering is in progress — Can new forests of young bigtrees be made to replace the old Photographs by the Author Zodlogy of the Stefansson-Anderson Expedition — A Preliminary JUST ORO eee ace Ete EAR RET aa Die A SELES re SZ R. M. Anderson in Unexplored Arctic America.................. 238 With quotations from this zoélogist’s letters written to the Museum during the past four years MacwGiant.Porest. Pig. <2 0.000. a ote Frepertc A. Lucas 243 A New Exhibit.in the Darwin Hall................ Roy W. MINER 245 Sea worm group made from field studies at Woods Hole, Massachusetts PePnnas IE OL VWALED oor ca usle s+. te Dalvie s woes BasHFORD DEAN 251 ie lmportance.ot Insects ):\..i022 2-0.) odeee We ee Frank E. Lutz 253 Facts and Theories relating to the Ancestry of Man.W. D. MatrHew 255 New Accessions of Meteorites.............. Epmunp Otis Hovey = 257 An Exploration of Northeastern Korea........ Roy C. ANDREWS — 259 Important zodlogical collections from a region of unexplored forests and lakes Wan ENTT a TN OES: OP doa ee ae ony ak EE a oe 268 Mary Cynraia Dickerson, Editor Subscription, One Dollar per year. Fifteen cents per copy A subscription to the Journat is included in the membership fees of all classes of members of the Museum Subscriptions should be addressed to the AMeRican Museum Journat, 30 Boylston St.} Cambridge, Mass., or 77th St. and Central Park West, New York City Entered as second-class matter January 12, 1907, at the Post-Office at Boston, Mass., Act of Congress, July 16, 1894 1g¢z o3ed ,,‘Joye@M JO INO USI V». — Jopuemeres B OF SoljelIMIs [einjont}s ‘sTeUIUe SUIAT[-PUeT 0} OSTI BARS QoIys Ysy jo pury 99 seim4yord Iojoo ojed SI 4[ ‘“e0Ue4STxo Ul BOLIJY WOIJ TURD 4] s}I sosn 4] [e197e] SUT ‘MOOT Axe GIIM UY woe Sit ‘yoo[S ‘po dn-polip & Jo W0#}0q 94} WOIJ YAVO JO pop Aup ®& 3S 3HL—HSISONN1 ONIAIT V suryiys Auew sey pues Jiapueme[es @ JO Sse] 9} qgsas3ns 0} UOTYysey & UL SUy ysysunt 9y.L “(1g% a8ed uo 9nd IM sie~dul0D) qysIe1ys pue ozeor[ap SUG Jo}eM-JO-JNO JO SYJUOM S}T WIOIZ PoloAODI AjNJ UMOYS dJ0Y SI pue UrTvoT}S Saivis GaLiINNM AHL OL 1HDONOUE YSAS NAWIOAdS GNOOD The American Museum Journal Vo. XII NOVEMBER, 1912 No. 7 “‘Lady Lena” bigtree with room cut out and door fitted in the trunk. Diameter 21 feet. Sequoia National Forest, Tulare County, California PRESENT CONDITION OF THE CALIFORNIA BIGTREES ' By George B. Sudworth [CHIEF OF DENDROLOGY, UNITED STATES FOREST SERVICE] VERYONE who has visited California’s famous sequoias admits that their real grandeur and the reverence they inspire cannot be appreciated without standing in their presence. Comparisons with other trees fail utterly to give a correct impression of their gigantic size. 1 The Museum's specimen of bigtree collected by special expedition to California some twenty years ago, has been recently moved from the Darwin hall to the west end of the forestry hall. Here it has been newly faced off and put again on exhibition with labels pointing out the centuries of growth from 550 A. D. to 1891 A. D. and relating the history of this growth to that of the development of the world’s science and art. Interest in the bigtree is peculiarly great at this time when wood and forest production are recognized paramount inimportance to the American nation. Is there a future as wellas a past for this tree from prehistoric times, which has the ability to attain a height of 300 feet and an age greater than that of any other living thing, and which has remarkable value whether destined for the timber market or permanently for the mountain side? Can young sequoia forests be made to rise on land bared of their giant forefathers by fire or lumbermen? The question has been a disputed one. Dr. Sudworth’s article represents personal investiga- tion in the various California groves. The photographs are by the author.— M.C.D. 227 [O06T UE poydeasoj0Yd] 4so10,q TRUOMeN vIONbeg Ul MOIA JOLo{U, “WOTZ{SOdxe [eTUUN}U90 O44 1OJ WOTJOES B UTES OF OAST Ul IND SBAI 991} SIYL 3aULDIG NOILISOdX3 IVINNSLN30 4O ANNYL G3NYNa a0 CALIFORNIA BIGTREES 229 With the possible exception of a sister species, the Coast redwood, and some of the Australian eucalypts, the bigtree is unique among the world’s living arborescent plant forms. While it lives in a land where pines and firs grow to enormous size and to great age, even the largest of the latter is small in comparison with the sequoia towering one hundred to one hun- dred and fifty feet higher, its trunk broader by twenty or more feet, and from two thousand to nearly three thousand years older. The North Calaveras bigtree grove was the first one discovered (1841), and the renown of this tree in America and abroad probably came chiefly from accounts of the trees as seen there, although later from the Mariposa grove. Forty or more years ago botanists and a few explorers knew in a general way that the sequoia ranged from the North Calaveras grove south- ward in the Sierras to the Tule River country, but until quite recently we have had no published account of the exact location and extent of all of the existing “groves”’ and “forests.”’ Singularly enough however, the locations of these trees, so long unknown to published literature, were familiar to the early back country settlers and lumbermen, and particularly Log cuttings and broken, waste trunks on cut-over bigtree land near sawmill, Sequoia National Forest 230 THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL to cattle and sheep men whose herds browsed beneath the giants even fifty or sixty years ago. Passing over the question of whether or not the bigtree should be called Sequoia gigantea, Sequoia wellingtoniana or Sequoia washingtoniana, far ‘ - s - Bigtree 20 feet in diameter damaged by fire, Redwood Mountain Forest, Tulare County, California. Nearly every large sequoia in California is scarred by fire more interesting matters are what exactly is the range of this ancient tree, and how is it holding its own in the struggle for existence with other trees of its range. Thirty-one large and small groups are now known. They are more or less widely separated from one another, extending on the north from a point in the Sierras near the southern boundary of Placer County CALIFORNIA BIGTREES 231 for one hundred and fifty miles as the crow flies, southward to the head of the south fork of Deer Creek (a tributary of White River) in Tulare County. The different groups contain from half a dozen to several thousand trees and cover from less than an acre of ground to ten square miles, aggregating 3 — * - ' a —s-- . ¥ & & a im F . Looking along the trunk of a bigtree crushed in falling. Lumber operations, Fresno County. Recent cuttings of bigtrees are in the King’s River and Kaweah River forests. altogether about fifty square miles. They are mountain trees, growing naturally only at elevations from 5000 to 8500 feet. Ownership of lands carrying bigtrees is variously divided between private individuals and the federal government, and with few exceptions all of the trees are within the national forests of California, where irrespective of ownership, the government guards them as much as possible against fire. iposa iter, 2 . ate oat ¥ ye ~ Megha: ees aS OM! ae s " . ha ty ae dy Am mite i s * PS bY x,t! ae \ Ses GRE eS uards,’’ Yosemite National Park, Mar Pak. Pens # is. a WwW > o ec So 2