NO. 3 SMITHSONIAN EXPLORATIONS, IQI5 63 
made to the fine suburb of La Plata, where resides Dr. Carlos 
Spegazzini, the leading authority on Argentine cactuses. 
From Buenos Aires a trip was taken across Argentina to Men- 
doza, a city situated near the foot of the Andes, in a region favorable 
to the growth of succulent plants. From there a short excursion 
was made to Portrerillos, Argentina, on the railway which leads to 
Valparaiso, Chile. Many very interesting plants were found in both 
these places. 
In the city of Cordova, Argentina, northwest of Buenos Aires, 
the cactus collection of Dr. Frederick Kurtz was found to contain 
some rare types, which were very kindly submitted for examination 
and study. In this vicinity, as well as in the neighboring town 
of Cosquin, many cactuses were collected on the semiarid peneplain. 
In addition to good sized collections of cactuses, consisting of 
living, herbarium, and formalin specimens, moderately large collec- 
tions of insects, shells, diatoms, and other natural history speci- 
mens were obtained. In all about 8,000 herbarium specimens were 
obtained and over go cases, large and small, of living plants were 
sent back to the United States. The living collection is now on 
exhibition at the New York Botanical Garden. 
The expenses of this expedition were chiefly borne by the Carnegie 
Institution of Washington and the New York Botanical Garden. 
SHELL MOUNDS ON THE PACIBIC COAST 
While serving as representative in charge of the exhibit of the 
Institution at the Panama-Pacific International Exposition, Dr. Wal- 
ter Hough had an opportunity to examine some of the shell mounds 
which are numerous around San Francisco Bay. In this work he 
was aided by Prof. T. T. Waterman and Mr. E. W. Gifford of the 
University of California. A large mound in West Berkeley which 
had been sectioned by grading for factory sites, leaving a mass which 
appeared to be the central portion, and presenting a face 12 feet in 
height, was selected for operations and enough work was done to 
secure data as to its strata of accumulation, human, animal, and art 
contents. Within three feet of the base under ashes were found 
the skeletons of several infants. This find was considered note- 
worthy, a similar deposit not having been found before. Artifacts 
were not common in this section of the mound. There were found 
plummets, sinkers, hammers, grinding stones, awls, antler wedges, 
and rarely obsidian blades. 
