i4 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



very small specimens, representing three species, were secured, one of 

 which proved to be new to science. 



Of insect life we learned little, and our collections were unimpor- 

 tant. A few butterflies, moths and bees were seen, while beetles were 

 more noticeable. Mosquitoes may be dismissed with the remark ap- 

 plied to the snakes of Ireland : there are none. 



Xo exploring ship ever carried a more industrious scientific staff; 

 its store of zoological and botanical plunder grew daily and the lab- 

 oratory lights burned into the small hours for the identification of 

 species and the preservation of specimens. The naval corps and the 

 sailors also warmed up to the work, bringing in birds, mammals, fishes 



Cassius Teen. Straits of Magellan. 



and plants, some of them wielding the clumsy coal shovels from the 

 fire-room, in digging ancient stone and bone implements from the 

 shell heaps. Some of the shell heaps or " kitchen middens " as the 

 archeologist called them, were several feet thick. Digging into them 

 was laborious and the results called forth only contemptuous remarks 

 from the sailors. A few arrow-heads, bone, flint and stone imple- 

 ments with bones of seals, and mussel and limpet shells did not seem 

 to them worth the effort. But the ancient camp sites showed to those 

 who could read their story, that the native population of the past 

 had lived as simply as their descendants of the present, had subsisted 

 on the same food, used the same primitive tools and camped on the 

 same spots. There were doubtless more of them as barbarians decrease 

 in numbers after contact with the white race. 



Large mammals were, with the exception of fur seals and Antarctic 

 sea lions, not common along the line of our operations, but foxes, 

 otters, coypu, Ctenomys and other small fur bearers of the far south 



