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TEE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL 



Among the specimens brought back by 

 Mr. Barnum Brown from his expedition to 

 the Red Deer Eiver, Alberta, in 1915, were 

 two petrified tree trunks, finely preserved 

 and nearly complete. One of these, forty- 

 five feet in length, two and one half feet 

 wide at the butt, and tapering to a slender 

 tip, has been placed on exhibition in the 

 dinosaur hall of the Museum. These tree 

 trunks are from the Belly Eiver formation 

 of Cretaceous age, and were associated with 

 skeletons of dinosaurs. Together with va- 

 rious leaves and other plant remains found 

 in the same beds, they serve to illustrate the 

 kinds of vegetation that prevailed where 

 these dinosaurs lived. The trunk now on 

 exhibition is not that of a tree which grew 

 tall and spindling in a dense forest, but is 

 the type that would grow in an open glade, 

 branching strongly all the way up. When 

 the specimen was unearthed, the branches 

 were all attached, but could not be preserved 

 as they were completely turned to lignite. 

 An interesting circumstance in the preserva- 

 tion of these petrified tree trunks is that the 

 outer layer, above and below, is converted 

 into lignite (carbonized), and the inside of 

 the trunk is partly converted into agate 

 (silicified), the cells of the wood being filled 

 with siliceous deposit, while their framework 

 is still preserved in lignite. Some of the 

 trunks are round, but they are usually flat- 

 tened, partly as a result of compression. 

 The lignite varies in thickness over different 

 parts of the tree, but if compression is dis- 

 regarded, the difference in vertical and 

 horizontal diameters shows a conversion of 

 approximately four inches of wood to one 

 inch of lignite. Some of this lignite has 

 been preserved on the trunk now on exhibi- 

 tion, although it was not practicable to pre- 

 serve the entire coating. 



Dr. Edgar Alexander Mearns, who died 

 in Washington, D. C, near the close of the 

 year 1916, was one of the first of the many 

 men of science who have participated in the 

 work of the American Museum. He was born 

 at Highland Falls, N. Y., September 11, 

 1856, studied medicine at Columbia Univer- 

 sity, and in 1883 entered the army with the 

 grade of First Lieutenant Assistant Surgeon. 

 At the time of his death he held the rank of 

 Lieutenant Colonel, Medical Coi-ps. His 

 greatest military service was during the 

 Spanish-American War, when he served as 



Brigade Major in Cuba and later organized 

 the hospital camp at Chattanooga. 



His connection with the American Museum 

 began in 1883, when he donated a series of 

 skins and eggs of North American and Eu- 

 ropean birds, the former to remain un- 

 mounted as the basis of a study collection. 

 At this time he was engaged to identify, 

 label, and catalogue the collection of Eu- 

 ropean birds, then larger than that of the 

 North American birds. His first comprehen- 

 sive paper, on birds of the Hudson High- 

 lands, published in 1878, was based on 

 material found about his home at Highland 

 Falls; from that time onward, wherever he 

 chanced to be, he found scientific work to 

 do. His appointment as surgeon to the 

 Mexican Boundary Commission of 1892- 

 1894, resulted in his publishing Mammals of 

 the Mexican Boundary of the United States, 

 and while stationed in the Philippines, in 

 spite of poor health, he made important or- 

 nithological and botanical collections. He 

 was a member of the Roosevelt African ex- 

 pedition in 1909, where his enthusiastic work 

 as a collector won for him from the natives 

 the title, "The Man Who Never Sleeps." 

 Colonel Roosevelt states that he was by far 

 the best shot of the party. On this expedi- 

 tion he secured large and important collec- 

 tions of birds and mammals, and of botani- 

 cal material. He also accompanied Mr. 

 Childs Frick to Africa, where again he made 

 extensive collections of birds and small mam- 

 mals. He was emphatically a field natural- 

 ist. Although his published papers number 

 more than a hundred, they were largely 

 based upon material personally collected. At 

 the time of his death, he was engaged in the 

 study of the large African collections he had 

 brought together. 



For his many services to the American 

 Museum he was elected a Patron in 1890. 

 He was a prominent member of the Linnsean 

 Society of New York, one of the founders 

 of the American Ornithologists' Union, and 

 of the National Geographic Society. In his 

 early years Dr. Mearns was one of the group 

 of young, enthusiastic, and energetic natural- 

 ists which included Merriam and Fisher, men 

 whose work was not only important in itself, 

 but did much to stimulate others to under- 

 take zoological work. His death is a decided 

 loss to science. Ever kindly and helpful, 

 never a harsh critic, and always ready to aid 

 with word or act, he will be sadly missed. 



