I HE ALUMNI JOURNAL. 



89 



4. From guaiacol, vanillin is obtained: 

 a) through introduction of an alde- 

 hyde group by treatment with 

 chloroform and caustic potassa ; 

 U) through conversion into guaiacol- 

 carboxylic acid, introduction of 

 an aldehyde group and splitting 

 oflF of the car boxy 1 group ; 

 c) through conversion into guaiacol 

 di-carboxylic acid, treatment with 

 chloroform and caustic potassa 

 finally removing the ortho car- 

 boxyl group. 



GIANT BIRDS OF AnERICA. 



THE COCOPAH MOUNTAIN VULTURES ARE 



LARGER THAN CONDORS. 

 {Los Angeles Correspondence of The Philadelphia Times.) 



While the International Boundary 

 Commission has resurveyed the territorial 

 lines between the United States and 

 Mexico and has set up a string of granite 

 monuments all the way trom El Paso 

 westward to San Diego, on the Pacific 

 Ocean, since September, 1892, it has been 

 the means of giving to the scientists of 

 the world much valuable information. 

 The country through which the commis- 

 sion worked its way from El Paso west- 

 ward is probably as wild, desolate and 

 dangerous to human life as any on this 

 continent. Thousands of square miles 

 through which the boundary line between 

 the Union and Mexico runs is as hope- 

 lessly a burning desert as the Sahara. 

 There are mountains and canyons there 

 that have never been trod by white men, 

 and any company of a dozen or so white 

 men would be hazarding their lives to 

 attempt to go there for purposes of ex- 

 ploration. The temperature in that region 

 ranges from 110° to 125° for weeks at a 

 time in summer. 



When the International Boundary 

 Commission and its accompanying body 

 of United States soldiers and laborers 

 started from El Paso on an expedition of 



three years the opportunity to send men 

 for scientific purposes along with the 

 party was eagerly improved by the author- 

 ities of the Smithsonian Institution at 

 Washington and at the Academy of 

 Sciences at the City of Mexico. There 

 were mineralogists, geologists, entomol- 

 ogists, geographers and general natur- 

 alists in the party, and they gathered to- 

 gether literally a carload of specimens in 

 the animal, vegetable and mineral king- 

 doms. 



The most fruitful results of the scien- 

 tific expedition were those among the 

 birds and animals. Dr. Edgar A. Mearns, 

 United States Army, had charge of the 

 collecting of ornithological and mammal 

 specimens in the progress across the de- 

 serts and mountains and through the 

 Cocopah Indian region. The doctor and 

 his assistants collected nearly 20,000 

 specimens of curious life, and they have 

 been busy for weeks in arranging the 

 enormous collection. The doctor has 

 packed his specimens in San Diego and 

 has gone on to the Smithsonian Institu- 

 tion with them, expecting to put in some 

 two years in classifying them and putting 

 them in shape for the information they 

 will impart to naturalists everywhere. 



Among other birds making their last 

 stand in the Cocopah Mountains before 

 the advance of man is one of noble size — a 

 bird that, as a strong, powerful and grace- 

 ful flyer, is the peer of American birds. It 

 is a California vulture. In size it is 

 larger than the South American condor, 

 that king of birds in the cloud-touching 

 Andes. Few of these birds are left in 

 California, and they are not numerous 

 even in that part of the Cocopah Moun- 

 tains traversed by Dr. Mearns. It has 

 been remarked that the California vulture 

 is a cowardly bird, but the members of 

 Dr. Mearns' party do not think so after 

 observing one of these vultures fight a 

 rattlesnake. It was in the early morn- 



