November, 1841.] 125 



Dr. Leib found the nest of the blue-winged Teal (Anas discors,) 

 together with that of the Mallard (Anas boschas,) in the month of 

 June, in the meadows adjoining the marsh above referred to. 



It is composed externally of dried grasses, neatly arranged in a 

 circular form, and lined with a thick bed of down, taken from the 

 breast of the female. It contained 18 eggs of a delicate cream 

 colour, which measure 2 inches by 1| inch. Though remarkably 

 timid and wary at other times, such is its abstraction or devotion 

 when upon the nest, that it would suffer me to approach near enough 

 to strike it with a stick ; then in the greatest alarm, suddenly flutter 

 and bustle off through the grass for some distance, like a wounded 

 bird ; until, satisfied that the ruse had diverted attention from its 

 treasure, it would mount into the air and quickly leave the object 

 of its terror and solicitude behind. 



Dr. Morton made some remarks on the so called Pigmy race 

 of people who are asserted to have formerly inhabited a part 

 of the Valley of the Mississippi. 



It has long been contended by intelligent persons, who, however, 

 were ignorant of anatomy, that the adjusted bones of individuals of 

 this race, never exceed four feet and a half in height, and are 

 often but three feet. These statements induced Dr. Morton to inves- 

 tigate the subject by means of a skeleton of one of these people, 

 which he at length obtained through the kindness of Dr. Troost of 

 Nashville ; Mr. A. M'Call, a correspondent of Dr. Troost, having 

 exhumed these remains from a cemetery near the Cumberland 

 Mountain, in White county, Tennessee. 



" The coffins," observes Mr. M'Call, in the letter read by Dr. 

 Morton, "are from 18 to 24 inches in length, by 18 inches deep 

 and 15 wide. They are made of six pieces of undressed sandstone 

 or limestone, in which the bodies are placed with their shoulders 

 and head elevated against the eastern end, and the knees raised 

 towards the face, so as to put the corpse in a reclined or sitting pos- 

 ture. The right arm rested on an eathern pot, of about two pints 

 in capacity, without legs, but with lateral projections for being lifted. 

 With these pots, in some graves, are found basins and trays also of 



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