258 
instant. They neared the circle, which 
broke on one side, and as it became a semi- 
circle, the dance ceased. The leader and 
katcina then circled around the drum. The 
leader shouted in the ear of the katcina at 
frequent intervals his ‘“‘ Yah-hai — yah-hai”’ 
and yelled his incantation, waving the 
balance-looking arrangement. This, by the 
way, is the charm that attracts the katcina 
and yet holds him off [Sullivan]. After several 
rounds of this yelling, singing, shouting and 
jumping, the leader returned to the kiva, 
slowly followed by the skipping katcina. 
The circle continued the dance, closing its 
ranks, and so on until another leader and 
katcina made their appearance. Sometimes 
there were three or four at the same time and 
then the noise was deafening. 
All day long this continued, and all day I 
stood my ground with camera and sketch 
book, notwithstanding certain disapproving 
looks from the dancers. At one time I 
THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL 
thought they meant to tell me to stop using 
the camera but they did not do so; probably 
as they had never seen a hand camera before, 
they did not understand its nature. With 
the plates manufactured then, and the slow 
shutter, it was very difficult to get the swiftly 
darting figures; and that day I was as much 
of an object of interest to the visiting Navajo, 
and the Hopi from the other towns, as were 
the katcinas and the dancers. Nobody 
molested me however and at sunset when the 
long procession of katcinas and leaders had 
passed through the village and received the 
contributions of sacred meal and prayer 
feathers from the populace, all weird enough 
in the gloaming, I returned to my housetop 
and slept without a break until Hoski, my 
native boy, after his usual fashion, threw the 
door open in the morning and set down the 
olla of water which he always brought up 
fresh from the spring near the foot of the 
mesa, some seven hundred feet below. 
MUSEUM NOTES 
A JoINnT anthropological expedition will be 
undertaken with the University of Colorado 
of which the distinguished anthropologist, 
Dr. Livingston Farrand, is now president. 
The field party will be under the direction of 
Mr. N.C. Nelson, assistant curator of anthro- 
pology in this Museum, and Mr. E. H. Morris, 
curator of the University Museum, and will 
explore the little-known cliff-dwelling regions 
of Colorado. 
Tue New York Academy of Sciences has 
published an essay on ‘‘Climate and Evo- 
lution” by Dr. W. D. Matthew. This is an 
attempt to find in the slow cyclic climatic 
changes of geologic time a fundamental cause 
controlling the course of evolution and geo- 
graphical dispersal of animals and plants. 
The author accepts the view that the deep 
ocean basins have been substantially perma- 
nent during the later ages of geologic time, 
the continents alternately emerged and more 
or less completely united to the northward, 
or submerged and extensively overflowed 
and isolated by shallow seas. The continen- 
tal shelf at or near the one hundred fathom 
line marks the extreme limit of emergence. 
The epochs of elevation have been associated 
with arid climates and polar cold; the epochs 
of submergence with warm moist uniform 
climates. The record of the evolution and 
dispersal of the various races of mammals 
is interpreted in accord with this theory, 
that of the lower vertebrates briefly outlined. 
Tue New York Aquarium gave its second 
annual reception to the members of the New 
York Zodlogical Society on the evening of 
May fifth. About five hundred guests were 
present and were entertained with motion 
pictures of marine life. The Aquarium had 
just come into possession of a new collection 
of tropical fishes from Key West, which were 
on exhibition, and two more porpoises had 
been secured for the porpoise pool. 
Some years ago Mr. G. Frederick Norton 
began a special study of the so-called blue or 
“‘olacier’’ bear (which had been named Ursus 
emmonsi). These bears are confined to the 
vicinity of Saint Elias range of mountains in 
Alaska and have a very limited distribution. 
Mr. Norton secured a number of skins and 
skulls which have satisfactorily demonstrated 
that the blue bear is only a color phase 
of the black bear (Ursus americanus). The 
black bear apparently is a polychromatic 
animal and has several well-marked color 
