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POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



nite and more ambitious than these minor ex- 

 cursions is the school journey, which may last 

 from three days to three weeks. It is usually 

 taken on foot, and is as inexpensive as possi- 

 ble, with plain food and simple accommoda- 

 tion. Each boy carries his own knapsack 

 charged with a change of underclothing, 

 towels, soap, etc., and overcoat or umbrella ; 

 while for the common use of the party 

 are distributed clothes brushes and shoe 

 brushes, needles, thread, string, and pins, 

 ointment for rubbing on the feet, a small 

 medicine chest, a compass, a field glass, a 

 pocket microscope, a barometer, and a tape 

 measure. The district visited is chosen on 

 account of its historical associations or the 

 geographical illustrations it furnishes, or the 

 richness and variety of plant life to be 

 studied. Constant pauses are made to afford 

 opportunities for the examiuation of features 

 inviting study; and the scenes visited are 

 often closely connected with the subjects in- 

 cluded in the year's work of the school. In 

 a journey, of which Miss Dodd was a mem- 

 ber, preparations were begun three months 

 beforehand, with the collection of subscrip- 

 tions, drawing of road maps, and special les- 

 sc ns. The fifty boys from ten to fifteen years 

 old, marched off in groups of four, assort- 

 ing themselves according to their affinities 

 for companionship, with advance and rear 

 guards ; the regions passed through were 

 explored for what might be found in 

 them ; the roads were marked and identi- 

 fied, mountains and rivers were named, and 

 the courses of streams determined; and at 

 each place of considerable interest its char- 

 acteristic features and associations of Na- 

 ture, art, and history were discussed and 

 studied. 



The Hnichol Indians of Jalisco.— The 

 Huichol Indians of Mexico, the subject of a 

 study by Carl Lumholtz, four thousand peo- 

 ple living in the mountains of northern Ja- 

 lisco, have a tradition that they originated in 

 the south, got lost underneath the earth, and 

 came forward again in the east, in the coun- 

 try of the Kikuli, near San Luis Potosi. 

 Franciscan missionaries converted them nom- 

 inally to Christianity, but there are now no 

 priests in their country, and there is prob- 

 ably no tribe in Mexico where the ancient 

 beliefs have been so well maintained as with 



them. Their exterior conditions have been 

 somewhat altered by the introduction of cat- 

 tle and sheep, and cattle are now the favorite 

 animals for sacrifice at the feasts for mak- 

 ing rain during the dry season. The people 

 are healthy, very emotional, easily moved to 

 laughter or tears, imaginative and excitable. 

 Young people show affection in public, kiss- 

 ing or caressing one another. They are kind- 

 hearted and not inhospitable to those who 

 can gain their confidence, but have the repu- 

 tation of being wanting in regard for truth. 

 They live mostly in circular houses made 

 from loose stones, or stones and mud, and 

 covered with thatched roofs. Their temples, 

 devoted to various gods, are of similar shape, 

 but much larger, with the entrances toward 

 sunrise. Outside of the door is an open 

 space surrounded by small rectangular god- 

 houses, with gabled and thatched roofs. The 

 god-houses are also frequently found in the 

 forests, and are sometimes circular. There 

 are nineteen temples in the country which 

 are frequented at the times of the feasts, 

 when the officials and their families camp 

 in the small god-houses. Idols are not kept 

 in the temples, but are hidden in caves or in 

 special buildings. There are a great many 

 sacred caves devoted to various gods, and 

 generally containing some pool or spring that 

 gives them sanctity, and the water of which 

 is supposed to have salutary virtues. Much 

 religious importance is attached to the Kikuli 

 cactus, which produces an exhilarating effect 

 on the system. Ceremonial arrows are in- 

 separably connected with their life, the ar- 

 row representing the Indian himself in his 

 prayers to the gods. They have other in- 

 teresting ceremonies and ceremonial objects, 

 and a curious system of distilling, which Mr. 

 Lumholtz describes at length. 



Herrings at Dinner. — The food of the 

 herring consists of small organisms, often of 

 microscopic dimensions. It is entirely ani- 

 mal, and in Europe, according to those who 

 have investigated the matter, it consists of 

 copepods, schizopods (shiimplike forms), 

 amphipods (sand fleas and their allies), the 

 embryos of gasteropods and lamellibranchia, 

 and young fishes, often of its own kind. In 

 the examination of about fifteen hundred 

 specimens of herring at Eastport, Maine, and 

 vicinity, in the summer and fall of 1893, Mr. 



