﻿82 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 74 



Two very profitable weeks were spent at the herbarium of ihe 

 Paris Museum. In this institution the Lamarck Herbarium and that 

 of ]\Iichaux are segregated. Dr. A. S. Hitchcock had studied these 

 collections in 1907. Mrs. Chase made drawings and took some addi- 

 tional photographs. The Paris Herbarium is exceedingly rich in 

 early American collections, such as those of Humboldt and Bonpland, 

 Poiteau, Gaudichaud, Bourgeau, and D'Urville. The Fournier Her- 

 barium, the basis of Fournier's JMexicanas Plantas, was of very great 

 interest. 



An important early paper on American species of Paspahim was 

 by LeConte, 1820, an American of French descent. His herbarium is 

 deposited in the Academy of Sciences, Philadelphia. When the col- 

 lection there was studied a few years ago some of his species were 

 not represented. Dr. Asa Gray, in a biographical note on LeConte, 

 states that LeConte took his collection with him on a visit to France 

 and that he was very generous in allowing his friends to have speci- 

 mens. It was a great satisfaction to find the missing LeConte speci- 

 mens in the Paris Herbarium. 



Two weeks were spent in London, studying the grasses in the Kew 

 Herbarium and in the herbarium of the British ^luseum. Both of 

 these herbaria contain much that is of greatest importance to Ameri- 

 can agrostology. 



Botanizing in herbaria does not afford the same pleasure as does 

 botanizing in the field, but it is not without its thrills of discovery. 

 Current concepts of several species were found to be erroneous ; that 

 is, our ideas were those of later authors instead of those of the 

 original ones. 



RECENT DISCOVERIES OF ANCIENT MAN IN EUROPE 

 Under a grant from the Joseph Henry Fund of the National 

 Academy of Sciences, and upon the conclusion of his work as chair- 

 man of the American Delegation to the XX International Congress 

 of Americanists at Rio de Janeiro, Dr. Ales Hrdlicka proceeded to 

 Europe to examine the more recent discoveries of skeletal remains 

 of early man and several of the most important sites where these 

 discoveries have been made. 



In this quest Dr. Hrdlicka visited Spain, France, Germany, Moravia 

 and England. The important specimens studied included the jaw of 

 Baiiolas in Spain ; the La Quina site and specimens in southern 

 France ; the La Ferrassie skeletons, now beautifully restored, in Paris ; 

 the Obercassel finds in Bonn; the I^hringsdorf discoveries and site 



