408 



THE AMERICAN MUSEUM .lOUIiXAL 



which these collections have exerted on tex- 

 tile art was clearly shown by the Exposition. 

 In the section occupied by the Fairchild Com- 

 pany, Inc., in which about one hundred and 

 fifty broad silks and silk ribbons were dis- 

 played, it was surprising to find so large a 

 number with design motives taken from 

 Museum specimens. The artists had drawn 

 from our birds and butterflies, and from the 

 Peruvian, Colombian, Mexican, Philippine, 

 Amur River, Chinese, Japanese, and North- 

 west Coast collections. The designs appeared 

 on silks manufactured in Paterson, Lodi, and 

 Hoboken, New Jersey; in Columbus, Ohio, 

 and in Boston, Philadelphia, and Chicago. 



This sixth exposition by the National 

 Textile Association was the largest and 

 broadest in its scope of the series. All pro- 

 cesses of the manufacture of textiles, from 

 the raw fiber to the finished product, were 

 shown with the machines actually in opera- 

 tion. There was also an exhibition of hand 

 loom weaving and spinning and a very ex- 

 tensive exhibition presented by the dye 

 manufacturers to demonstrate the progress 

 of the dye industry which is new in Amer- 

 ica, dating from the beginning of the war. 

 A little playlet was staged twice daily, using 

 fashions designed by American designers, 

 and executed in American materials. More 

 than $15,000,000 worth of machinery was 

 sold to manufacturers in this country, and 

 orders were taken from Europe to be deliv- 

 ered after the war. The greatest interest 

 attaches to the orders taken by Mrs. Annette 

 Sterner Pascal for hand-woven tapestries. 

 They aggregate 16,3.30 square feet, to be 

 used chiefly for church decorations in this 

 country. A new exhibition is already being 

 planned in which greater attention will be 

 paid to the finished product and in which 

 documents from the American Museum will 

 be shown in the proportion which the im- 

 mense amount of material available de- 

 mands. 



Whale meat has lately been put into the 

 municipal markets in the city of Portland, 

 Oregon, and Seattle, San Francisco, and 

 other coast cities are promoting its use ener- 

 getically. As a result, all whaling factories 

 on: the Pacific Coast will be equipped this 

 year to utilize, either canned or in cold 

 storage, the meat of whales for food. In 

 fact, the Victoria Whaling Company already 

 has placed the entire output of one cold 

 storage jjlant, and other orders are coming 



in rapidly. It is probable that the demand 

 on the Pacific Coast will be so great that 

 little of the meat will be sent to eastern 

 cities. The British Government also is con- 

 sidering the use of whale meat, and com- 

 munications have been addressed to the 

 American Museum regarding its utilization. 

 Using whale meat for food is not a new 

 departure. For centuries the islanders of 

 Scotland have included it in their diet, and 

 the same may he said of the Japanese. As 

 early as 1261 whales' tongues were an im- 

 portant article of commerce, subject to spe- 

 cial tax, in the Basque provinces and 

 Gascony, on the Bay of Biscay. In Japan 

 the wholesome meat is eaten either fresh or 

 canned, a single whale sometimes supplying 

 as much as eighty thousand pounds. The 

 seven whaling stations on our Pacific Coast, 

 together with the one on the Atlantic side of 

 the continent, have a combined catch during 

 the summer of about one thousand whales, 

 which, if fully utilized, would make avail- 

 able for distribution throughout America a 

 yearly supply of nearly fifty million pounds 

 of palatable and nourishing food. The meat 

 is darker colored and somewhat coarser 

 grained than beef, but has no fishy flavor, 

 and when properly cooked tastes much like 

 venison. An analysis of the canned meat 

 made recently by the Bureau of Fisheries 

 at Washington showed its protein value to 

 be thirty-four per cent as against thirteen 

 to fourteen per cent in beef, mutton, or 

 pork. The "Whale Steak Luncheon" at the 

 American Museum on February 28 contrib- 

 uted largely toward the publicity which has 

 been given to the use of whale meat as food 

 since the first of the year. 



Tales from Birdland, by T. Gilbert Pear- 

 son, secretary of the National Association 

 of Audubon Societies, has just been issued 

 from the press of Doubleday, Page and 

 Company. These ten short stories about 

 birds are equally fascinating reading for 

 young or old. The scenes are laid in many 

 parts of the country, from the rocky shores 

 of Maine to the cactus-covered plains of 

 Arizona and from Florida to Oregon. A 

 true picture is drawn of each region and its 

 wild life, with added human experiences 

 both grave and humorous. The illustrations, 

 fifty in black and white, with frontispiece 

 in color, are by Charles Livingston Bull, and 

 add greatly to the attractiveness of this 

 small volume. 



