290 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1926 
going down. Besides the Quadrula, there were a great number of 
very small gastropods, some less than 3; of an inch in diameter. 
A careful log was kept by the engineer in charge of the work, Mr. 
Malin, which will be published when the fossil material has been 
studied by Dr. A. W. Grabau, chief paleontologist to the Geological 
Survey. 
4. Sang-kan Ho Beds—In 1923 a farmer brought me part of a 
silicified rhinoceros femur and several other petrified bone fragments, 
all of which were said to have come from the same locality near 
Ho Chih Liao in the Sang-kan Ho Valley. Later similar silicified 
mammal bones were shown me at Kalgan by Pére Vincent of 
the Mission Apostolique. The reverend Father has made a series 
of scientific contributions in several branches of natural history, and 
in conversation was able to confirm from personal observation the 
theory current locally among the villagers that the present course of 
the Sang-kan Ho west of Ni-ho-wan cuts through a lake deposit 
of olden days; this perhaps influenced the theory of the American 
geologist Pumpelly (9) regarding the past changes in the course of 
the Yellow River. I made a brief reconnaisance of the area during 
the summer of 1924.*° 
Forty miles southwest of Hsuan-hua in the valley of the Sang-kan 
River there is a magnificant development of terraces cut in two 
super-imposed series of nonmarine beds. ‘The lower series are green 
and brown in color and carry large bivalves, one type like the 
Quadrula of San-Men, the other much more fragile and without 
the florid bosses which ornament the coarser type. The beds also 
have gypsum and plant remains and abundant small gastropods 
like those at Tientsin. The upper beds are of a uniform brown color, 
and lie on an erosion surface of the lower series. Locally they seem 
to pass up into a dark brown loesslike deposit without marked 
stratification. Silicified mammal bones and bits of Struthiolithus 
were found in this upper series. The problems raised by these beds 
are so vital as to call for careful study. 
During the spring of 1925, Pere Licent and I were able to visit the 
area and found many deposits of silicified mammal bones. Pere 
Licent has since returned to the locality and secured a large collection 
of fossil material. A preliminary study by Pére Teilhard de 
Chardin appears to confirm the fact that the fauna, which indicates 
a steppe association, is of basal Pleistocene age. 
More recently I have found fresh-water beds with abundant 
mollusks along the railway east of Huai-lai. The species are just 
enough unlike those found in the Ni-ho-wan beds to suggest a dif- 
10 See Geol. Soc. China Bull., vol. 3, No. 2, Peking, 1924, p. 167. 
