October, 1919] 



The Canadian Field-Naturalist 



65 



then (1868) was not known to exist east of the 

 Alleghany mountains." 



The discovery of bison bones in a cave on the 

 upper Tularosa river, New Mexico, has extended 

 the southwestern range of this mammal over one 

 hundred miles.^ 



One of the most recent discoveries is that of 

 some deer bones in Nova Scotia. Mr. Smith found 

 a distal phalanx and some teeth in shell-heaps on 

 Merigomish harbor, and I found several astragali, 

 distal'' and proximal phalanges, the distaL end of 

 a humerus and teeth in a shell-heap on Mahone 

 bay, about seventy-five miles west of Halifax. 

 Nicholas Denys'" (circa 1653) does not mention 

 the deer, and the first printed record of its appear- 

 ance in Nova Scotia was in 1888. Even in New 

 Brunswick it was not seen until 1818, only be- 

 coming plentiful by 1847." 



Although they were plentiful in the days of early 

 settlement, caribou seem to have been scarce around 

 Mahone bay in prehistoric times, only a small piece 

 of antler, doubtfully referred to this species, being 

 found in the shell-heap there. Only a few in- 

 dividuals, also, are represented among the animal 

 remains from Merigomish harbor. 



Some archaeological discoveries may help to 

 settle uncertain or disputed points in zoology. For 

 instance, I found in the prehistoric shell-heap on 

 Mahone bay, the shells of the land snail Helix 

 horiensis Miiller,^- and Dr. G. F. Matthew found 

 some in a shell-heap at Bocabec, New Brunswick.^^ 

 They have also been found on an island in Pen- 

 obscot bay, Maine, ^^ and on Martha's Vine- 

 yard.'" This snail is considered to be "unques- 

 tionably identical with the European species," and 

 it was for a long time generally accepted by 

 conchologists that it had been introduced from 

 Europe. Morse, however, considered it "strange 



"Wyman, Dr. Jeffries, An Account of Some 

 Kjoekkenmoeddings, or Shell-heaps, in Maine and 

 Massachusetts, The American Naturalist, 1868, 

 Vol. I, p. 572. 



sLyon, Marcus W., jr., Mammal Remains from 

 Two Prehistoric Village Sites in Xew Mexico, Pro- 

 ceedings of the L^. S. National Museum, 1907, Vol. 

 XXXL pp. 647-648. 



oldentification confirmed by Dr. Gerrit S. Miller, 

 of the L'.S. National Mu.seum. 



i"Description and Natural History of the Coasts 

 of North America (Acadia), translated and edited 

 by W. F. Ganong. Published bv the Champlain 

 Society (Toronto, 1908). 



iiChamberlain, Montagu, Mammals of New 

 Brunswick, Bulletin Natural History Society of 

 New Brunswick (St. John, 1884), No. Ill, p. 39. 



i2ldentiflcation confirmed bv C. W. Johnson, 

 Curator, Boston Society of Natural History. 



i3Discoveries at a Village of the Stone Age at 

 Bocabec, N.B., Bulletin Nat. Hist. Soc, New Buns- 

 wick, No. Ill, p. 24. 



i4Johnson, C. W., Helix hortensis from a Maine 

 Shell-heap, The Nautilus, 1914-1915, Vol. XXVIII, 

 p. 131. 



1 "..Johnson, C. W., The Distribution of Helix 

 hortensis Muller, in North America, ibid., 1906, 

 Vol. XX, p. 76. 



that, while in the old country it is found near the 

 habitations of men, in this country it occurs only 

 upon the most uninhabitable islands."^" The shells 

 found in the Mahone bay shell-heap, while they 

 still retain traces of the rarely occurring rufous 

 revolving bands, bear the same appearance of age 

 as the other shells composing the heap. There is 

 a possibility that these snails worked their way down 

 into the shell-heap recently, perhaps by way of the 

 burrows of small mammals, but if this were really 

 so we would expect them to be almost as fresh 

 looking as recent shells. Besides, if these snails 

 crawled into the heap recently, why did we not 

 find other species also? Dr. Matthew found 

 the shells of no less than six native species of snails 

 at various levels in the heap at Bocabec, and Morse 

 reported nine from a heap on an island on the 

 coast of Maine. ^" It seems to me, therefore, just 

 as probable that the snail shells from the Mahone 

 bay shell-heap were deposited with the rest of the 

 shells when the heap was formed as that they were 

 intrusive. This and other testimony would tend to 

 prove that the species was indigenous or else had 

 found its way to America through other channels 

 than commercial intercourse long before the arrival 

 of Europeans on this continent. ^^ Possibly they 

 came by way of the much discussed land-connec- 

 tion between the old and the new world.^ 



The occurrence in a shell-heap on an island in 

 Casco bay, Maine, "of the Httle snail Zua lubri- 

 coides" Stimpson (now known as Cochlicopa 

 lubrica Muller), is also, according to Morse, "in- 

 consistent with the view that it is an introduced 

 species. - 



It is still doubtful whether Litorina litoreci 

 (Linn.), or "Periwinkle," is an indigenous species 

 or one introduced from Europe. No shells have 

 yet been found in any of the prehistoric shell-heaps 

 of the Atlantic coast, but if some were found deep 

 in one of these heaps it would certainly be indis- 

 putable evidence that this species was here long 

 before the advent of the white man. The possibil- 

 ity of finding this shell again suggests the necessity 

 for careful and thorough methods of archaeological 



i6The Land Snails of New England, The Am- 

 erican Naturalist, 1868, Vol. I, p. 187. 



irWyman, op. cit., p. 566. Also Proceedings 

 of the Boston Society of Natural History, 1866-1868, 

 Vol. XI, pp. 301-302. The presence in the lowfr por- 

 tion of this particular heap of so many species of 

 snails which, as Morse notes, can only exist in 

 hardwood growths, whereas the island at the time 

 of the exploration of the shell-heap was covered 

 with large spruce trees, would argue a consider- 

 able antiquity for the shell-heap. 



issee Johnson, op. cit., pp. 73-80. See also Dr. 

 W. H. Dall's Land and Fresh-water Mollusks 

 (Harnman Alaska Expedition, New York, 1905), 

 Vol. XIII, p. 20, for its occurrence in the glacial 

 Pleistocene of Maine. 



i9See Scharff, R. F., Distribution and Origin 

 of Life in America (New York, 1912), p 14 



20Wyman, op. cit., p. 566. 



