POPULAR MISCELLANY. 



429 



in the ancient margin of the lake, two hun- 

 dred and twenty-five feet above the present 

 level of Lake Erie, but one hundred feet lower 

 than any of the outlets of the chain of tri- 

 antrular lakes which had been the nucleus of 

 this great inland sea. Southwestward from 

 this water-gap runs a broad but now almost 

 deserted water-way communicating with the 

 valley of the Wabash River, and by this 

 passage the drainage of the "Erie-Ontario" 

 basin found an outlet to the Mississippi. 



The Head-Waters of the Orinoco. — The 



Guaharibos, an Indian tribe living near the 

 head-waters of the Orinoco, are described by 

 M. Chaffaujon as of small and mean stature, 

 with slender limbs, stomach inordinately dis- 

 tended, long and coarse hair, and bestial 

 physiognomy. They were absolutely nude, 

 and carried nothing but a stick. Their repast 

 consisted of palm-shoots, a quantity of half- 

 rotten fruit, and some balls composed of 

 white ants. Some others, to whom the trav- 

 eler exhibited at a distance pieces of cloth, 

 knives, etc., fled as soon as he attempted to 

 get near them. The source of the Orinoco 

 was found to be a mountain-torrent springing 

 from a peak which was named Ferdinand de 

 Lesseps, in the Sierra Parima range (3,300 

 feet high). M. Chaffaujon studied the re- 

 markable bifurcation of the Orinoco by 

 means of the Cassiquiare, whereby a connec- 

 tion is established with the Rio Negro and 

 the Amazon, and found it to be the result of 

 the undermining and washing away of the 

 clay banks of thj river during the rainy sea- 

 son. The outlet from the Orinoco descends 

 a few inches every year, and is now nearly 

 half a mile from its original position. In 

 entering the Cassiquiare the current has the 

 same force as that of the Orinoco, but quickly 

 increases in rapidity after traversing the clay 

 deposits. This communication between the 

 two streams is believed to be recent. 



The Progress of Cremation. — It is now 



fourteen years since Sir Henry Thompson 

 proposed cremation as a method of disposing 

 of the dead eminently desirable to be adopted 

 on sanitary grounds. The proposition fell as 

 a shock upon a large part of the public ; and 

 it may be recorded as among the curiosities 

 of the human mind that, although there is no 

 conceivable relation between cremation and 



religion, it was regarded by many persons 

 hisih iu the Church as a covert attack on 

 Christianity. Yet it was not new ; for it 

 had been proposed in Italy in 1866, experi- 

 mented upon by Gorini and PoUiui, with pub- 

 lished results in 1872, and illustrated, with 

 the display of a model furnace at the Vi- 

 enna Exhibition of 18'73. The Cremation 

 Society of England was formed in IS'74. 

 Opinions of legal authorities were obtained 

 to the effect that the proposed process wa3 

 not illegal, provided no nuisance was occa- 

 sioned by it. An arrangement with one of 

 the London cemeteries for the erection of a 

 crematory on its grounds having been vetoed 

 by the Bishop of Rochester, an independent 

 property was obtained at Woking, on which 

 a Gorini furnace was erected. A test of this 

 apparatus, made by Prof. Gorini himself in 

 1879, showed that in it complete combustion 

 of an adult human body could be effected in 

 about an hour, so perfectly that no smoke or 

 effluvia escaped from the chimney, every 

 portion of organic matter being reduced to a 

 pure, white, dry ash, absolutely free from 

 anything disagreeable. Several cremations 

 had in the mean time taken place abroad ; one 

 at Breslau and one at Dresden in 1874, and 

 two at Milan in 1876. The Cremation Society 

 of Milan was established in 1 876, and soon 

 became popular and influential. It erected 

 a handsome building, with a gas, and after- 

 ward two Gorini furnaces, in which four hun- 

 dred and sixty-three bodies were cremated to 

 the end of 1886. Similar buildings have 

 been built and used at Lodi, Cremona, Bres- 

 cia, Padua, Varese, and Rome ; and iu all 

 seven hundred and eighty-seven bodies have 

 been cremated in Italy. The only place in 

 Germany where the practice has been regu- 

 larly followed is Gotha, where a building was 

 constructed with the permission of the Gov- 

 ernment, in which four hundred and seventy- 

 three cremations were performed from Jan- 

 uary, 1879, to the 31st of October, 1887. 

 Cremation societies have been established in 

 Denmark, Belgium, Switzerland, Holland, 

 Sweden, and Norway, and in various parts of 

 the United States. A crematory has been 

 built in Paris, and was first used on the 22d 

 of October last. The English crematory did 

 not go into operation until 1884, after Mr. 

 Justice Stephen had pronounced his judgment 

 that the process was legal, if performed 



