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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



of beings. Paleontological discoveries on 

 the one side, and those which submarine 

 explorations promise us on the other, will 

 gradually rill these voids, and will, perhaps, 

 some day permit naturalists to grasp Jhe 

 relations which exist between animals." 



Images of the American Stone Age. 



^mong all the relics of the stone age, said 

 Mr. William McAdams, in his paper on the 

 subject, read at the Cincinnati meeting of 

 the American Association, none are of more 

 interest to the student of ethnology than the 

 sculptured forms of men and animals found 

 on some of the stone objects taken from the 

 mounds. These objects might be divided 

 into four classes : 1. The mound-pipes, with 

 a curved or crescent-shaped base forming the 

 stem, the bowl of the pipe representing some 

 animal. These pipes are not made of very 

 hard stone, as has generally been supposed. 

 They are quite small and delicate, many of 

 them showing both taste and skill in man- 

 ufacture. 2. A class consisting of much 

 larger and somewhat exaggerated represen- 

 tations of men and animals, many of them 

 having a crouching, sphinx-like form, strong- 

 ly resembling the ancient forms from the 

 Nile. Some of them have no perforation, 

 but the majority of them have two funnel- 

 shaped perforations, and were probably 

 used as pipes on occasions of great cere- 

 mony. Some of these images, from mounds 

 in Illinois, weighing ten or twenty pounds 

 or more, are sculptured from hard stone, 

 and are anion;; the finest works of the 

 stone age. 3. A class of singular mask-like 

 figures, in which the human face alone is 

 represented presumably of the natural size. 

 The fourth class consists of representations 

 of the human form which may have been 

 real idols. One from Union County, Illi- 

 nois, cut from quartzite, the most refractory 

 material known, represents the body in a 

 Pitting posture, with the hands on the knees, 

 has a face with features not those of a 

 modern Indian, is smooth and highly pol- 

 ished, and is, perhaps, the finest piece of 

 aboriginal sculpture that has been found in 

 the United States. Mr. McAdams thought 

 these objects were used in religious observ- 

 ances, and believed that the evidence showed 

 that the mound-builders were fire-worship- 

 Professor Putnam, who is one of the 



unbelievers in a distinct race of mound- 

 builders, remarked that many of the sup- 

 posed idols, pipes, etc., may have been toys 

 for children. 



The Telelogue. The visibility of sig- 

 nals designed to be seen at a distance de- 

 pends upon the contrast between the light 

 given by the signals and that of the ground 

 against which they are seen. The contrast 

 has commonly been obtained in aerial te- 

 legraphy by exhibiting dark bodies against 

 the light of the sky. To make this effective, 

 it is necessary to raise the dark bodies to 

 some height, and this involves the use of 

 apparatus which must be more or less cum- 

 brous. In the telelogue of Captain Gaumet, 

 the difference in brilliancy required to give 

 distinctness to the signal is gained by em- 

 ploying a silver surface designed upon a 

 dark ground. A slight inclination of the 

 apparatus is enough to cause the silver to 

 shine very brightly, and in strong contrast 

 with the dark ground, by the reflection of 

 the diffused light which it receives from the 

 ! sky. For signals, Captain Gaumet employs 

 the letters of the alphabet and the numerals, 

 remembering that we most readily recog- 

 nize those forms with which we are famil- 

 iar. The telelogue consists of two essen- 

 tial parts: the telegraph-album, or book of 

 signals, and a telescope. The telegraph- 

 album is a collection of forty leaves of 

 coarse black cloth on which the silver sig- 

 nals, including the letters of the alphabet, 

 the numerals, and a few conventional sig- 

 nals, are fixed. To secure economy of bulk 

 while the letters shall be as large as pos- 

 sible, each signal occupies the reverse of 

 one leaf and the front of the leaf behind it, 

 as is shown in the figure, where the leaf 

 that is turned down bears the lower part of 

 the T on its back, and the upper part of 

 the letter is exposed on the leaf behind it. 

 Each leaf is marked with an index to en- 

 able the operator to find it quickly. The 

 cover of the album is made of stiff leaves, 

 which put together form a table or a rigid 

 back, and one of which is furnished with 

 feet, to which a third foot is added, con- 

 stituting a tripod when the apparatus is 

 used. The telescope should be strong and 

 very clear. The dimensions, both of the 

 allium and telescope, will depend on the 



