Page:Science vol. 5.djvu/521

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.

486

��Afteb devoting hlmsi-ir (or a number of years to the special study of somatology, and alio to the more general acqulremenU necessary for an ethnologlat, Dr. H. Ten Kate, jun., born in La Hague, set out on different expeditions lo study some tribes and nations in natura. Be accompauled Prince Bonaparte to Lapland and Finland in the summer of 18S4, and in the present year has undert&ken an extensive trip to Surinam, aided by subsidies from a number of sci- eatiSc societies. The expedition wiiich he undertoolc through the south-west of the United Slates and the nortii-trest of Mexico was performed in the space of ftlraut thirteen months, — from November, 1SS2, to De- cember, ISSy, — and resulted in many valuable discov- eries and obserratlons, descrll)ed by him ftt length in bis recent volume written In Dutch, ' Reiien en on- derzoefcingenlnNoord-Amerlka' (Leiden, Brfii, IS85, 464 p., 8°), with map and ttrop1a[«s containing views, portraits of Indians, etc. Having reached the west through Texas and Arizona, be first paid a visit to So- nora, and the southern extremity of the CalUomlan peninsula. He found there graves of the Perlcii Indi- ans, whose skulls and bones proved them to belong to aroce anthropologically distinct from theCochimI, and other tribes farther north in the same peninsula. He left that dry country to pass through Sonora again, and north to the Qila RlVer. to the Mohave reserve on Colorado River, to central Aiizona, to the PApogo and Apache-Tinn£ settlements in the same territory. to 2uni and the PuebtoB of New Mexico scattered along the Klo Grande. The aboriginal tribes lust seen by him were the southern Utes and the tribes in the centre and the east of the Indian Territory. We easily understand that the space of thirteen months was but a short lapse of time, considering the immense area travelled over, and the large num- ber of Indian tribes and other objects of ethnolo^c interest which came under his observation; but, in reading the long and interesting report, we must acknowledge that the traveller has made the best use of the opportunities offered him. There is an endless variety of remarks on botany, geology, zocil' ogy; on Indian dresses, customs, pictograplis, color adjectives; on government, politics, history, and po- litical economy of the countries visited. We also meet at times with a few pungent remarks on the traders, cowboys, politicians, and 'judges' in the far west, — otiservations which greatly help to brighten the narrative, and enhance the Interest we lake In it.

Several smaller articles auxiliary to this report were issued by Dr. Ten Kate before Its appearance. Their purpfise is lo give scientific accounts of Indian craniums, bodily admeasurements, tribal names, etc: they are written in French.

��>Dggest«d that bowlders and gravels found In differ- ent parte of Australia are of glacial origin, the evi- dence is vague, and no clear proof of glaciation has been brought forward. During a recent ascent of the highest ranges in Australia, — parts of the Austra- lian Alps, — where he discovered a peak which he named Mount Clarke, 7,25C feet high, he found traces of glaciation in the form of rocha motitonnie)i throughout an area of about a hundred square miles. The best preserved of the ice-worn surfaces were found in a valley named by the author the Wilkin- son valley, running from north-east to south-west, immediately south of Miiller's Peak and the Abbot Range. No traces of ice-action were found at less than S,800 feet above the sea. The rocks showing ice- action are all granite; and the fact that the surfaces have been polished by glaciers is said to be proved by the great slie of such surfaces, by their occurrence on spurs and projecting points, by many of them being worn down to the same general level, and by their not coinciding in direction with the joints that trav- erse the rock. Dr. von Lendenfeld's paper closed with a comparison of the evidence of glacial action in Australia with that in New Zealand.

Prof. T. G. Bonnay considered that more evidence WAS necessary in order lo establish the point con- tended for by Dr. von Lendenfeld. All his proofs were founded on granite, which had a constant tendency lo form rounded iHiBses. The fact that the supposed roches moutonnies occurred on spurs, rendered the matter still more doubtful, seeing that In small glaci- ated tracts such surfaces were chiefly found in valleys, tl was a remarkable, and to him a very suspicious, fact that no moraines or perched blocks were noticed : in fact, the only point of importanceadduced in favor of the author's view seemed to be the difference in the direction of the joint-planes and of the rounded surfaces ; and this he thought Insufficient.

Mr. W. T. Elanford agreed with Professor Bonney, and mentioned examples of the occurrence in the plains of India, where glaciation was out of the ques- tion, of granite surfaces simulating rochen mouttm- n^es, and of larger dimensions than those cited by the author. It seemed to him not impossible that Dr. von Lendenfeld was right ; but the evidence brought forward was certainly not sufficient, The circumstance most in favor of a glacial origin for the supposed rocAcs moutunniet was their restriction to a particular elevation.

��THE GLACIAL PERIOD ly AUSTRALIA.

I\ a paper on this subject recently read to the Geological society of London, Dr. R. von Lendenfeld said, that, although several previous writers have

��THE RECENT CHOLERA CONFERENCE IN BERLIN.

At the recent cholera conference in Berlin, May 3-8, the principal disputants were Koch and Pett«n- kofer, the former aaeerllng, and the latter denyiug, the specific character of the so-called ' comma ' bacliloa o( cholera.

The following summary of the position of each, taken from reports that have just reached us, ma; be of Interest to our readers.

Koch's grounds for bis assertions he sums up aa follows : I. The constant occurrence of the bacillus

�� �