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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



quire. Every track in the trail, mark in the 

 grass, scratch on the bark of a tree, explains 

 itself to the " untutored " Apache. He can 

 tell to an hour, almost, when the man or 

 animal making them passed by, and, like a 

 hound, will keep on the scent until he catches 

 up with the object of his pursuit. 



The Pine Belt of New Jersey.— The 

 "pine belt" of New Jersey is described by 

 Dr. I. H. Piatt as a strip of land about sixty 

 miles long by from eight to twenty miles 

 wide, reaching from a few miles south of 

 Freehold almost to Yineland. Its soil varies 

 from a light, sandy loam to clear beach sand. 

 Its streams, which are sufficient for drainage, 

 have good banks which they rarely if ever 

 overflow, and there is no wet meadow. There 

 are a few peat-bogs, some marl-beds, and 

 occasionally a cedar swamp, but these feat- 

 ures are all of very limited extent. The 

 belt comprises in all about five hundred and 

 seventy square miles, and has a population 

 of 14,475 persons. The region has long en- 

 joyed a local reputation for healthf ulness, and 

 some parts of it have been mainly settled 

 by people who have sought it for that reason. 

 According to the reports of the State Board 

 of Health, its average death-rate during the 

 six years, 1883 to 1888, inclusive, was 12*65 

 per thousand, against 18 '65 per thousand 

 for the whole State, or 15*07 for the State 

 excluding cities ; and the death-rate from 

 consumption was 1*60 against 2*53 and 2*12. 

 The comparatively low mortality from con- 

 sumption is the more striking when we 

 recollect the extent to which the region is 

 sought by persons in feeble health. 



The Month-slitting Botocudos.— A mon- 

 ograph on the Botocudos of Brazil and their 

 ornaments has been published by Dr. John 

 C. Branner, in a reprint from the papers of 

 the American Philosophical Society. It is 

 illustrated by photographs showing the man- 

 ner of wearing the ear- and mouth-plugs 

 from which the tribe derive their name 

 (bo(ogue } lip-ornament), the appearance of the 

 slits when they have been torn, and the 

 younger members of the tribe who have 

 ceased to practice the mutilation, or have 

 reduced it to the simple wearing of earrings. 

 Mr. John Stearns said, in a paper before the 

 Royal Geographical Society, on the Explo- 



ration of the Rio Doce and its Tributaries, 

 that the custom of these Indians of slitting 

 the lower lip for the purpose of inserting a 

 wooden ornament in it has been described by 

 visitors to the American coasts from Cabral 

 down. When Cabral sent a boat ashore in 

 Brazil to investigate the country, the men 

 told him on their return that they did not 

 believe the natives were men, though they 

 were dressed up in feathers and painted in 

 colors, for they had two mouths. The In- 

 dians were accustomed to take out the lip 

 ornaments, and, while the teeth were grin- 

 ning from the upper mouth, to push out the 

 tongue from the lower one. Cook, two hun- 

 dred and eighty years later, at Prince Will- 

 iam's Sound, Alaska, heard one of his sailors 

 say to another, " Come here, Jack, look at the 

 men with two mouths." A writer of that 

 period tells of the wife of a great chief at 

 Sitka, that by a singular motion of the lower 

 lip she could raise it in such a way as almost 

 to cover the whole of her face. Mr. Colin 

 Mackenzie has cursorily followed out the 

 geographical line of this singular custom, 

 and has found that it could be traced, with 

 very few breaks, from Alaska to the coast 

 of Brazil. 



Medicinal Plants. — The pamphlet of Mr. 

 Charles Mohr, on The Medicinal Plants of 

 Alabama, besides the list of the plants, with 

 notes on their distribution and the proper 

 time of collecting the parts used, contains 

 some facts of interest respecting the flora of 

 the State and the home of its medicinal 

 plants. The flora of Alabama includes a 

 majority of the plants noted for their re- 

 medial value which are found in North 

 America east of the Rocky Mountains. The 

 plants furnishing drugs of the greatest im- 

 portance have their home principally in the 

 woodlands of deciduous-leaved trees in the 

 northern section of the State. With the 

 enormous decrease of the forest area north 

 of the Ohio River that has taken place dur- 

 ing the last thirty-five years, the supply of 

 crude drugs furnished by that territory has 

 been correspondingly reduced. The resources 

 existing in the more elevated regions of the 

 South have consequently been resorted to. 

 Within the past ten or fifteen years North 

 Carolina has become the center of the most 

 active trade in this line, which is gradually 



