166 PROCEEDINGS OF THE CALIFORNIA 



Donations to the Cabinet : Dr. Cooper presented forty species of 

 shells, mostly collected by himself on this coast, and not before in 

 the Museum. H. G. Hanks presented a bottle of pigment used by 

 the Indians in Mono county ; he also gave an extended analysis of 

 its properties, finding it to be hydrated sesquioxide of iron and 

 silica, reduced to a very fine powder. He had seen " pictured 

 rocks" in Kern County; and Dr. Blake mentioned others, near 

 Salt Lake, so old that the present Indians knew nothing of their 

 history, but preserving the colors very well. A specimen of Poly- 

 porus variegatus was presented by Mr. Turrill. 



Dr. Kellogg stated that the Indians use the herb Eritrichium 

 hirsutum as a dye, under the name of " Puccoon," the same given 

 by Eastern Indians to the Bloodroot, Smiguinaria Canadensis. 

 Dr. Cooper remarked that in Oregon a species of Trillium was 

 called " Bloodroot " by the settlers, though in no way related to the 

 Sanguinaria, which does not grow on this side of the mountains. 



Dr. Blake showed a chart illustrating by curves the variations of 

 the barometer as influenced by the moon. 



The observations were made at Iowa Hill, Cal., in 1855-6, and the oscillations 

 mapped from October to March, to be further completed hereafter. 



From the 3d to the 7th day after the new moon, the oscillations of the barom- 

 eter are but slight. From the 7th to the llth the oscillations are more mark- 

 ed, and the greatest disturbance takes place between the 12th and 16th days of 

 the moon ; from the 17th to the 21st days there is again a barometric calm, 

 followed by greater disturbance from the 22d to the 26th days and still greater 

 oscillations from the 27th to the 3d day of the new moon. 



These curves, so far as they had been carried out, plainly pointed to an influ- 

 ence of the moon on the movements of the atmosphere. The i-eason why the 

 barometric changes do not exactly coincide with the phases of the moon is pro- 

 bably owing to the centres of disturbance taking place at different places in differ- 

 ent months, their effect not being perceptible at other places until some hours, or 

 even days after. It has already been pointed out, for instance, that a storm at the 

 Sandwich Islands does not affect the barometer here until two or threedays after its 

 occurrence. In reply to some remarks made by Dr. Kellogg supporting the above 

 conclusions. Dr. Blake stated that the influence of the moon on the atmosphere was 

 very different from its effects on the ocean. He considered that instead of the 

 regular ocean tides, which were most marked at the new and full moon, the atmos- 

 phere was at these periods more liable to sudden changes at some parts of the 

 earth's surface, which produced the great barometric oscillations. 



