﻿NO. lO SMITHSONIAN EXPLORATIONS, I923 35 



The wound was not a subject of serious anxiety. Other conditions, 

 however, soon appeared. These and their subsequent course are de- 

 scribed by Dr. W. E. Hoy, Jr., Department of Biology. Presbyterian 

 College of South Carolina, in two letters dated October 14 and 18: 



Sometime between the 8th and 12th of August Charles was carried up the 

 mountain to Ruling, suffering from a gunshot wound in the leg. Kuling, as 

 you probably know, is tlie summer resort for foreigners in the Yank-tze valley. 

 The wound was caused by the accidental discharge of his revolver. The bullet 

 made a clean wound between the tibia and the fibula. No anxiety was felt for 

 his condition. My mother was on the mountain at the time and took care of 

 him. In the next few days my brother developed severe abdominal pains and 

 an attending physician pronounced it appendicitis. He was operated on im- 

 mediately. This was about the i/th. The operation was a long affair. The 

 appendix could not be found for several hours. The surgeons stated that the 

 appendix was gangrenous and bound, down by multiple adhesions. They ex- 

 pressed it as the worst case they had ever operated on. Just after I had 

 written to you the beginning of the week I received further letters from home. 

 My mother stated that Charles had had severe hemorrhages and that he lapsed 

 into coma on the sixth of September. That evening at six o'clock he ceased 

 breathing. 



MOLLUSCAN STUDIES ABOUT THE ELORIDA KEYS, 

 BAHAMAS, AND WEST INDIES 



The experiments in heredity which are being conducted by Dr. Paul 

 Bartsch, curator. Division of Mollusks, C'nited States National 

 Museum, under the joint auspices of the Smithsonian and Carnegie 

 Institutions required the addition of several elements to render these 

 studies as comprehensive as possible. For that reason transportation 

 was secured on May i, 1923, on the naval transport Henderson sailing 

 from Hampton Roads for Porto Rico. This inade possible a number 

 of stops ; viz., Guantanamo Bay, Cuba ; Port au Prince and Cape 

 Haitian. Haiti ; Porto Plata, San Domingo City, San Pedro Macoris, 

 San Domingo ; and San Juan, Porto Rico, in all of which places series 

 of minute shells were gathered. 



In Porto Rico Governor H. M. Towner was good enough to place 

 an automobile at Dr. Bartsch's disposal, to carry him and his collecting 

 outfit to Guanica Bay at the southwestern end of the island. This 

 gave him an opportunity to see the lay of the land and to understand 

 the zoo-geographic features which govern and underly the distribution 

 of the molluscan fauna. It also showed what a beautiful island Porto 

 Rico really is, and how it has been almost completely bent to human 

 use, with results that in most places very little of the original flora. 



