FRAGMENTS OF SCIENCE. 



281 



the disk flowers have been neglected. In the 

 chrysanthemums, by cultivating both, a be- 

 wildering variety of forms have been ob- 

 tained. It may be many years before the 

 disk flowers of the single dahlia can be 

 drawn out to so great a length as in some 

 of the chrysanthemums ; " but it can be 

 done, and there is no reason in the nature of 

 things why we should not have a race of 

 dahlias analogous to the anemone-flowered 

 chrysanthemums." The chrysanthemumlike 

 forms are already some of the best we have. 



Animals' Stores. — A writer on Animals 

 in Famine observes in the London Spectator 

 that if we examine the stores made by most 

 of the vegetable-eating animals that lay by a 

 " famine fund," we shall find " a rather cu- 

 rious similarity in the food commonly used 

 by them. They nearly all live on vegetable 

 substances in a concentrated form — natural 

 food lozenges, which are very easily stored 

 away. There is a great difference, for exam- 

 ple, between the bulk of nutriment eaten in 

 the form of grass by a rabbit and the same 

 amount of substance in the ' special prepara- 

 tion ' in the kernel of a nut, or the stone of 

 a peach, or the bulb of a crocus, off which a 

 squirrel makes a meal. Nearly all the stor- 

 ing animals eat ' concentrated food,' whether 

 it be beans or grain, hoarded by the hamster, 

 or nuts and hard fruits by the squirrel, nut- 

 hatch, and possibly some of the jays. But 

 there is one vegetable-eating animal whose 

 food is neither concentrated nor easy to move. 

 On the contrary, it is obtained with great 

 labor in the first instance, and stored with 

 no less toil after it is procured. The beaver 

 lives during the winter on the bark of trees. 

 As it is not safe, and is often impossible, for 

 the animal to leave the water when the ice 

 has formed, it stores these branches under 

 water, cutting them into lengths, dragging 

 them below the surface, and fixing them 

 down to the bottom with stones and mud. 

 This is more difficult work than gathering 

 hay." 



Ancient Man in the Delaware Valley. — 



At a joint session of the Geological and An- 

 thropological Sections of the American Asso- 

 ciation, held for the discussion of the Evi- 

 dences of the Antiquity of Man in the 

 Delaware Valley, Professor Putnam gave a 



general review of the whole subject and of 

 the statements made by Dr. Abbott in 1883 

 of the finding of supposed palaeolithic imple- 

 ments in the gravels near Trenton, N. J. 

 The more important of the facts brought up 

 have already been noticed in the Monthly. 

 During the investigation of the region under 

 Professor Putnam's supervision, in which 

 every foot of the tract — half a mile long and 

 one hundred feet wide — was dug over, photo- 

 graphs were taken of the chipped stones as 

 they were found in situ in the sand and 

 clayey deposits. These photographs and the 

 specimens themselves were exhibited to the 

 sections. While himself convinced that the 

 argillite implements found in this site were 

 the work of men anterior to the Indians, he 

 had invited other archaeologists and geolo- 

 gists to visit the place and investigate for 

 themselves. Several had done so, and had 

 reached conclusions similar to his and Dr. 

 Abbott's as to the antiquity of the argillite 

 remains. Papers were read by G. N. Knapp, 

 H. B. Kummel, Prof. Thomas Wilson, Dr. 

 H. C. Mercer, and Prof. R. D. Salisbury sub- 

 stantially in agreement with these views. 

 Prof. G. F. Wright held that the formation 

 of the clay indicated the action of water, 

 thus further attesting the great antiquity of 

 the find. Prof. W. H. Holmes held that the 

 implements simply indicated the beginning 

 of the Indian in that region. He thought 

 the sand was piled up by the action of the 

 winds, but did not touch upon the presence 

 of the clay. 



Ingenuity in Bow Making. — To estab- 

 lish the point that environment is not the 

 cause but the occasion of industries, and 

 that the true source of all arts must be 

 sought in the ingenious human creature, 

 Prof. 0. T. Mason cites the fact that the 

 withholding or the concealment of gifts by 

 Nature acts as a stimulus to ingenuity. 

 " Take, for example, the bow. There are re- 

 gions where the wood for this implement is 

 perfect, as in South America or the hard- wood 

 forests of the eastern United States. Here 

 the very embarrassment of riches leads men 

 to be satisfied with a very poorly made bow. 

 Now, the characteristics of a good bow are 

 rigidity and elasticity. When our ingenious 

 friend the Indian climbed the eastern slopes 

 of the Rocky Mountains away from the hard- 



