266 The Ottawa Naturalist. [February 



newer deposits were derived. In this field alone there is work for 

 a dozen members of the Club^ for a whole lifetime each, without 

 exhausting the subject. There is no better field in North America. 



Ever since the formation of the Club, the subject of Con- 

 chology, or the study of shells, has engaged the attention of 

 some of the members of the Club. Mr. Gilbert C. Heron, 

 Dr. James Fletcher, Mr. W. H. Harrington, Mr. J. F. 

 Whiteaves, Hon. Mr. Porier and lastly and conspicuously, Mr., 

 now the Hon. F. R. Latchford, have contributed valuable papers 

 regarding the various species of land and fresh-water shells of the 

 Ottawa district, and recorded such notes of observations and 

 descriptions of species as will enable any amateur, or other col- 

 lector of shells, coming within this district, to ascertain definitely 

 what species may be found, and will enable also outsiders to see in 

 what manner satisfactory results may be obtained and information 

 derived bearing on the shells of whatever district in which they 

 may be residing. 



In Ornithology, Messrs. W. L. Scott, W. A. D, Lees, A. G. 

 Kingston, Miss Harmer, Miss Ballantyne, Messrs. G. R. and T. 

 Whyte, and the Messrs. Saunders have contributed valuable notes 

 to the literature of the Club, whilst in Zoology proper, Mr. H. B. 

 Small, Mr. W. P. Lett, Mr. J. B. Tyrrell, Prof. Prince, Mr. Odell, 

 and Prof. Macoun have all given us a fair idea of the fauna of the 

 Ottawa district and elsewhere. hi the department ol chemistry 

 many important papers and contributions of special interest to the 

 Ottawa public and Canadian investigators, have appeared from 

 time to time from the pens of Mr. F. T. Shutt, Dr. R. F. Ruttan 

 and others. 



In the field of Archaeology, the Club has of late had a new field of 

 research open, and one full of promise. For a number of years past 

 it has been known that the Ottawa Valley was the home of many 

 tribes of aborigines, who left behind them in the sites of their 

 abandoned villages rude implements of the chase and of war, 

 relics of a bygone civilization which have only just begun to be 

 investigated. For years past, an intermittent stream of specimens 

 has come to the notice of the Ethnological division of the Geo- 

 logical Survey from various points in the Ottawa Valley, and in 

 Mr. Sowter's paper " On the Archaeology of Lake Deschenes," 



