320 ANNUAL OF SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERY. 



THE KABYLES. 



M. Duhousset ('* Comptes Rendus," March, 1868) gives the 

 physical characters of the Kabyle tribes of the northern slopes of 

 Mt. Djiirjura and of the region of the rivers Sahel, Sebaou, and 

 Isser. lie considers the Berber or Kabyle race as the most ancient 

 occupant of the north of Africa, if not indigenous there. An 

 Arabian tradition derives them from Egypt. They migrated even 

 to the desert, carrying their agriculture with them ; they bravely 

 resisted the Romans, retreating to the almost inaccessible moun- 

 tains. The population is more compact than in France, and every 

 available foot of ground is cultivated. 



From his observation, the Kabyle has an oval countenance, 

 widest above, the face appearing short on account of the width at 

 the temples ; the cranium is general!}' unsymmetrical. The av- 

 erage height is 1,690 millemetres, and comparatively few surpass 

 this. 



LIFE IN THE OCEAN DEPTHS. 



Prof. Edward Forbes and other distingruished naturalists have 

 maintained that the pressure at the lower depths of the ocean was 

 too great, that there was not sufficient light, and tliat the water 

 contained too little *air to allow of animal existence there. 



At the last meeting of the National Academy of Sciences, M. 

 Pourtales read a paper on the dredgings of the Gulf Stream. 



This was listened to with the greatest interest, for it upsets all 

 sorts of theories, and will suggest work in many new directions. 

 It has long been supposed that 100 fathoms was the greatest depth 

 at which animal and vegetable life could exist, but when Henry 

 Mitchell and Pourtales were appointed to the coast work between 

 Florida and Cuba, and pursued it partly in connection with explo- 

 rations for the submarine telegraph, a new state of tilings ap- 

 peared. The charts shovv near the shore a plateau of silicious 

 sand, spotted with banks of green sand, and then outside of this a 

 deposit of shelly and calcareous matter like the base of a coral 

 reef, far below 100 fathoms. Corallines were found at the depth 

 of 700 fiithoms. The fauna of Cuba and Florida coasts were found 

 to differ. A single dredging of 500 fathoms brought up a dozen 

 forms of life, and among them shells of the most delicate struc- 

 ture, and at the depth of 400 fathoms a crinoid of a wholly new 

 species, that being an extinct creature of which all the museums 

 in the world furnish not more than nine specimens of the only living 

 species. 



It is claimed that by these discoveries we become possessed for 

 the first time of a deep-sea fauna, containing several supposed ex- 

 tinct types, and that we find in the Atlantic also types supposed to 

 be peculiar to the South Seas. 



A full account of these interesting discoveries will be found in 

 the ** American Journal of Science," for Nov. 1868, p. 410. 



