April i, 1922] 



NATURE 



423 



Research Items. 



An American Pitt-Rivers Museum. — The famous 

 ethnological collection made by General Pitt-Rivers 

 first became known to students when it was exhibited 

 at the Bethnal Green Museum in 1874-75. In 1883 

 it was presented to the University of Oxford, and 

 since then, under the direction of Mr. Henry Balfour, 

 its value has greatly increased. The distinguishing 

 feature of this museum is that the exhibits are 

 arranged, not in geographical or racial order, but 

 in series illustrating the evolution of the chief human 

 inventions. A collection of the same kind was made 

 by the authorities of the United States National 

 Museum for the Trans-Mississippi Exhibition held 

 at Omaha in 1898, and since then it has been developed 

 by distinguished anthropologists like Mason, Holmes, 

 and Walter Hough, the author of an interesting 

 pamphlet discussing it, entitled " Synoptic Series of 

 (Objects in the United States National Museum 

 illustrating the History of Inventions." This pam- 

 phlet describes, with a good series of illustrations, 

 the chief inventions in the order of their development 

 —fire-making, torches and candles, lamps, cooking 

 itensils, knives and forks, and so on. The vast 

 resources of the American collections have produced 

 a fine series of examples. The present pamphlet, 

 adapted to our collections, might well serve as the 

 basis for a popular manual of ethnology. 



Stone Implements in the Perth Museum. — It 

 is a matter of great importance that the collections 

 in our provincial museums should be made more 

 readily accessible to students. They often contain 

 exhibits of considerable value, either the result of 

 excavations in some local area with its store of 

 antiquities, or of the benefactions of local collectors 

 or of travellers who have brought material from 

 abroad and are proud to share it with their neigh- 

 bours. The student, if catalogues are available, 

 will often find stored away in some local collection 

 just the link which he needs in some line of research. 

 Perth in its museum happily possesses exhibits of 

 l)oth these types — some implements locally discovered, 

 and those brought from foreign countries. In the Trans- 

 actions of the Perthshire Society of Natural Science 

 vol. vii, part 3) Mr. J. Asher publishes an excellent 

 ( atalogue of the collection, with full descriptive notes 

 and photographs of the more interesting specimens, 

 tie has also given references to works of authority, 

 Proceedings of learned societies, and the like, in 

 which objects of a similar type are described or 

 discussed, and it is satisfactory to learn that copies 

 )f all the publications to which reference is made 

 I re to be found in the Society's library. The 

 Scjciety has set a good example, which should be 

 followed in the case of all provincial museums. 



Indian Fishing Tribes in Vancouver's Island. — 

 The thirty-fifth annual report of the Bureau of 

 American Ethnology for the year 1913-14 is some- 

 what belated owing to the w^ar, but it contains matter 

 of much importance. It is devoted to a monograph 

 l)y Dr. Franz Boas on the Kwakiutl, a name applied 

 to a group of Indians on the Pacific coast in the 

 vicinity of Fort Rupert, Vancouver's Island. Dr. 

 iioas has edited the material collected by Mr. G. 

 Hunt, a mixed-blood Kwakiutl. This group of 

 Indians now numbers about 2000 souls, but it is 

 '.gradually decreasing. They speak languages of the 

 Wakashan linguistic stock, closely allied to the 

 Vootka. Many tribes on this part of the coast, 

 -gaining their livelihood by fishing, are distinct both 

 u physical characteristics and language, but their 



NO. 2735, VOL. 109] 



culture is of an uniform type, and their industries, 

 arts, beliefs, and customs are markedly different from 

 those of all other Indian peoples. Closer study, 

 however, discloses many elements peculiar to single 

 tribes, which show that this culture is the natural 

 result of a gradual and convergent development 

 from several distinct sources or centres, every one 

 of these tribes having added something peculiar to 

 itself to the sum of this development. This mono- 

 graph will hold a high place among the publications 

 of the Bureau, and it is full of interest to the anthro- 

 pologist, sociologist, and student of folk-lore. In 

 particular, the account of food and cooking, due to 

 Mrs. Hunt, an accomplished housewife, is admirable. 

 The detail of fishing customs is more elaborate, and 

 there are important sections on birth, in particular 

 on the subject of twins, and the customs of distributing 

 the trophies of the chase. For the philologist the 

 text is supplied both in English and in the local 

 dialect. 



New Surveys on the Arctic Coast ov Asia. — 

 While exploring the North-east Passage in 1918-19, 

 Capt. R. Amundsen wintered his vessel, the Maud, 

 in lat. 77° 32' 36" N., long. 105° 40' E., in the vicinity 

 of Cape Chelyuskin, the most northerly point of 

 the mainland of Asia. During the five months spent 

 at Maud Haven a considerable amount of useful 

 survey work was carried out in Taimir peninsula. 

 Mr. H. U. Sverdrup, a member of the expedition, 

 gives an account of this work, accompanied by a 

 chart in Naturen (January-February 1922), the 

 publication of the Bergen Museum. The previous 

 map of Taimir Land was very incomplete, although 

 considerable detail on the coast line was added by 

 Vilkitski in 1913. The map now shows a long fjord 

 on the east, where only a bay had been previously 

 known. Toll Bay, on the south-west, also ends in 

 two long narrow fjords. Exploration of the interior 

 reveals a plateau-like structure where the range of 

 the Birranga Mountains were formerly placed. 

 Around the plateau lies a raised beach some five to 

 twenty miles in width. Observations place Cap>e 

 Chelyuskin in lat. 77° 43' 26" N., long. 104° 17' E. 

 No new surveys appear to have been made in 

 Nikolas Land and Alexis Island, although the Nor- 

 wegians visited the latter. The paper also contains 

 a summary of the meteorological observations taken 

 at Maud Haven. 



Rains of Fishes. — For just on four hundred years 

 circumstantial stories of fish falling with rain have 

 appeared in various parts of the world. Naturally, 

 such strange occurrences have given rise to much 

 speculation and many even stranger theories by 

 way of explanation. The whole subject is admirably 

 reviewed by Dr. E. W. Gudger in the November- 

 December issue of Natural History — the Official 

 Organ of the American Museum of Natural History, 

 which has just reached us. Dr. Gudger accepts such 

 occurrences, and rightly, as well authenticated ; 

 he accounts for them as due to the agency of high 

 winds, whirlwinds, and water - spouts, which could 

 easily draw up either from the sea or rivers, shoals 

 of small fishes swimming at the surface in the track 

 of these uplifting agencies. As their force is spent 

 they distribute their victims along their path. 



Breeding Habits of the Merlin. — A series of 

 very valuable and interesting notes on the breeding 

 habits of the merlin was commenced some time ago 

 in British Birds. In the March issue, Mr. W. Rowan, 

 the author, describes the rearing of the young. 



