THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL 



only implements used in blanket work that they have borrowed 

 from their white neighbors are the shears with which they shear 

 their sheep and the cards used in preparing the wool for spinning. 



A COLLECTION of personal ornaments from the State of Oaxaca, 

 Mexico, pertaining to the Mixtecan-Zapotecan civilization, has 

 been presented to the Museum by the Duke of Loubat. 



This beautiful collection of the "gems" of ancient Mexico 

 contains more than three hundred objects of gold, copper, jadeite 

 of different hues from dark emerald green to white slightly tinged 

 with green, turquoise, rock crystal, amethyst, agate, chalcedony, 

 serpentine, obsidian and shell. Noteworthy pieces are a splen- 

 did miniature bell, made to represent the head of a monkey, a 

 string of gold beads, two tiny beads of gold made in filigree, a 

 frog carved out of rock crystal, a long perforated bead with spiral 

 design, made out of obsidian, and a parrot carved from a vivid 

 green pebble of jadeite. All of these specimens were found in 

 ancient graves, and together with our already extensive collec- 

 tion of similar objects, form a unique exhibit in the Mexican Hall 

 of the Museum. 



A LARGE relief map of the city and harbor of New York, 

 which was given by the firm of Johnson and Higgins to the New 

 York Chamber of Commerce, and presented by the New York 

 Chamber of Commerce to the American Museum of Natural 

 History, has been placed on exhibition on the ground floor near 

 the elevators. The elevations above, and the depressions below 

 the level of mean low water, have been greatly magnified as 

 compared with the horizontal scale. Although this gives a dis- 

 torted appearance to the general surface, it facilitates the com- 

 parison of the various altitudes, and tlie relative drainage areas 

 of the several river systems. 



Prof. J. C. Merriam of the 1 )e]iartment of Geology of tlie Uni- 

 versity of California spent about two weeks of tlie month of Janu- 

 ary at the Museum studying the collection of fossil mammals from 

 the John Day beds of Miocene Tertiary age from tlie Far West, 

 and identifying Oregon material from the California University 

 collections by comparison witli Professor (^.ope's type specimens. 



