59B 



NATURE 



[February 29, 19 12 



who had been trained at Oxford, was appointed assistant 

 in anthropology, and on June 15 Mr. Harlan I. Smith, 

 formerly of the American Museum of Natural History, 

 New York, entered on his duties as archajologist. Mr. 

 Smith is well known as a keen and conscientious 

 archaeologist who has done some good work in British 

 Columbia and elsewhere. The Canadian Government 

 deserves hearty commendation for its appreciation of the 

 need of an anthropological survey of Canada, and of the 

 excellent selection of a staff with which to carry it out. 

 May we be permitted to hope that at no distant date the 

 services of a physical anthropologist will be secured? 



It is true that a certain amount of work has already 

 been done in Canada ; but it has been of a sporadic 

 character, and without any system, except that done by 

 the Jesup North Pacific Expedition ; attention should, 

 however, be directed to the series of papers on the Salish 

 tribes published by Mr. Hill-Tout, mainly due to the 

 action of the British Association Committee, and to the 

 fine monograph on " The Great D^n6 Race," by Father 

 A. G. Morico, in Aniliropos, vols, i., ii., iv., v. Dr. Sapir 

 is fully aware of this ; and while investigations of limited 

 areas and peoples must first engage the attention of the 

 small staff, he has already mapped out the problems which 

 have to be solved, and thus the detailed work will fill 

 gaps in a well-thought-out scheme. The best general 

 account we have of Canadian ethnology is the valuable 

 Archaeological Report, 1905, printed by order of the Legis- 

 lative .Assembly, 'I'oronto, 1906. 



In a report published in Science, December 8, 191 1, 

 Dr. Sapir says : — " The ethnological work already under- 

 taken by the division embraces three distinct lines of 

 inquiry. Tiie first of these was undertaken by [himself] 

 among the Nootka, and resulted in the amassing of much 

 material of linguistic and ethnological interest. It is 

 intended to carry forward this work from year to year. The 

 second line of inquiry is the analysis of the culture of the 

 Iroquois, including under this term the Huron-Wyandots, 

 who were never included in the league. This work was 

 undertaken by Mr. Barbeau, who, beginning with the 

 Hurons of Lorette and the few Wyandots still left in 

 western Ontario, took up an intensive study of the 

 most conservative group of Wyandots, those of Oklahoma. 

 The study of the Iroquois proper, particularly from the 

 point of view of social organisation, was entrusted to Dr. 

 A. A. Goldenweiser, of Columbia University, who has 

 amassed much of value at Grand River Reserve. The third 

 point of attack was the culture of the eastern Algonkin 

 tribes. Here a beginning was made by Dr. Cyrus Mac- 

 Millan, of McGill, among the Micmac, and by Mr. W. H. 

 Mechling among the Malecite. It is hoped to begin system- 

 atic work among the Cree, Ojibwa, Plains tribes, and 

 tribes of the Plateau-Mackenzie region as soon as oppor- 

 tunity will permit. So far, the archaeological work of the 

 division has been confined to a preliminary reconnaissance, 

 by Mr. Smith, of the field in eastern Canada. Hand-in- 

 hand with research and publication, which must naturally 

 form the main activity of an anthropological survey of 

 Canada, is the building up of an anthropological section 

 of the national museum at Ottawa. At present the 

 museum is relatively rich in West Coast ethnological and 

 Ontario archaeological material, to the neglect of other 

 fields. Persistent efforts are now being made to round 

 out the resources of the museum. 



" The Canadian Government is to be congratulated on 

 having established a systematic survey of aboriginal 

 Canada. Now or never is the time in which to collect 

 from the natives what is still available for study. In 

 some cases a tribe has already practically given up its 

 aboriginal culture, and what can be obtained is merely that 

 which the older men still remember or care to impart. 

 With the increasing material prosperity and industrial 

 development of Canada, the demoralisation or civilisation 

 of the Indians will be going on at an ever-increasing rate. 

 No short-sighted policy of economy should be allowed 

 to interfere with the thorough and rapid prosecution of the 

 anthrooological problems of the Dominion. What is lost 

 now will never be recovered again." 



This is a very good example of the way in which the 

 overseas meetings of the British .Association justify them- 

 selves. A. C. Haddon. 



NO. 2209, VOL. 88] 



SOOT.' 



'T'HE smoke nuisance, like certain other public abuses, 

 ■*■ is rapidly approaching the acute phase which seems 

 necessary before the patient town dweller changes his tone 

 from an inarticulate murmur to a muttered complaint 

 sulViciently loud to awaken the slumbering authority to a 

 sense of his duly. 



The smoke abatement societies serve as his mouthpiece ; 

 thev have been formed to collect information, hold con- 

 ferences, organise exhibitions of smoke-preventing appli- 

 ances, and generally to create discontent with the pres. nt 

 whilst encouraging hope for the future. 



These societies have recently banded themselves togeihei 

 into a Smoke Abatement League, one of the objects of 

 which is to persuade the Local Government Board to 

 modify the present method of dealing with smoky 

 chimneys. If statistics furnish any guide for public 

 action, the League has fully justified its aims. Within the 

 last few months facts have been forthcoming from different 

 and quite independent sources showing not only the nature 

 of soot and its effects, but the actual amounts discharged 

 into the air and falling to the ground in the course of the 

 year. These quantities are not reckoned in cwts., but in 

 hundreds and thousands of tons. 



Messrs. Cohen and Ruston have shown that the quantity 

 per square mile which falls in Leeds increases from 25 tons 

 on the outskirts to 539 tons in the industrial centre of the 

 town. In London, Messrs. Des Vceux and Owens have 

 found the quantity to vary from 58 tons at Sutton, in 

 Surrey, to 426 ton's in Old Street, K.C., and Mr. Fyfe. of 

 Glasgow, in a paper read at the Manchester Smoke .Abate- 

 ment Conference, has found that whereas 72 tons falls at 

 the seaside village of Bo'ness, the amount in Glasgow 

 reaches about 820 tons per square mile. The three 

 large towns together show a total deposit of nearly 

 50,000 tons of soot a year, or about 18 lb. per head of the 

 population (6| millions). .At the same rate the yearly soot- 

 fall for the whole of the United Kingdom would reach 

 about 300,000 tons ; but this number is probably too 

 high, as it includes country districts where naturally the 

 quantity per head is much smaller. The method for 

 estimating the deposit which has been used in Leeds 

 was to collect rain water at eleven different stations 

 (ten in the town and one in the country) by means of a 

 large funnel placed in the neck of a Winchester quart 

 bottle, and to analyse the contents monthly during a whole 

 vear. These estimations included the soot (in which the 

 content of carbon, tar, and ash was determined) and th • 

 soluble constituents, viz. free and albuminoid ammonia 

 and nitrates, free and combined sulphuric acid, sulphurou'^ 

 acid and chlorine. In Glasgow the deposit was estimated 

 by means of eighty-three dust boxes, sixteen being dis- 

 tributed about Glasgow and the remainder placed in other 

 districts. They were left for two months (December, iqic. 

 and January. 191 1). and the contents were then weighed 

 and analysed for carbon, tar. and ash. Messrs. des Vocux 

 and Owens have used a similar method to that adopted in 

 Leeds, but on a much larger scale, substituting for the 

 funnel a large hopper connected with a capacious bottle. 

 The contents were treated as in Leeds, both insoluble and 

 soluble constituents being estimated. The experiments 

 were also continued throughout the year. There does not 

 seem to be any great advantage gained by the substitution 

 of the larger and more costly apparatus for the funnel and 

 Winchester quart bottle if the analyses are carried out 

 with sufficient care. 



In addition to the monthly sootfall. the I^eds experi- 

 ments have included the estimation of the total soot dis- 

 charged from domestic and factory chimneys, and the still 

 more important permanent deposit of tar, which is the 

 prime agent in the discoloration of buildings and foliage, 

 and (on account of its acid character) in the destruction of 

 masonry, mortar, fabrics, and %-egetation. The quantity of 

 soot produced in Leeds annually from factory and domestic 

 chimneys is roughly 35,000 tons, which is distributed as 

 follows : — 



' "Soot: its Ch.iracier :>nd Coi.p-sitio"." By Cohen and Rust r. 

 (four". Sot. Chem Ind., D'cember is, igri.) 



"Air Pollution in Ghsgow and Other Tow-s in Scotland." By Peer 

 Fyfe. Paper r. ad at the Manchester Smoke Abittment Conference, 

 November, ion. 



" The Sootfall of Ix)ndon." {TAe Lancet, January 6, 1912.) 



