414 Extinct Pleistocene Mammals 



this bird as similar to one in possession of Mr. Schoolcraft, at the 

 Sault Ste Marie.'" 



" Its mournful cry about the hour of my encamping, (which was 

 at sunset) had before attracted my attention, but I could never get 

 sight of the bird but on this occasion. There is an extensive plain 

 and swamp through which flows the Savannah River, covered with a 

 thick growth of sapin trees. My inference was then, and is now, 

 that this bird dwells in such dark retreats and leaves them at the 

 approach of night.' " 



The latter part of this account, though presenting as it does, a 

 mistaken impression, evidently furnished the suggestion for both the 

 scientific and common names of this bird. That it is an evening 

 singer or is in any special way associated with the decline of the 

 day is erroneous and the name by which it is now universally known 

 is without any particular significance. 



EXTINCT PLEISTOCENE MAMMALS OF MINNESOTA. 



N. H. Winchell. 



PLATES X. AND XI. 



[Read May, 1909.] 



There was an epoch of geological history, — how long in years or 

 centuries we do not know, but it must have been long — which preceded 

 the Glacial epoch, or epochs, and which followed after the Tertiary, 

 which is commonly called Pleistocene. During the Pleistocene the 

 climate of Minnesota was approximately the same as the present, and 

 the country was clothed more or less with a flora similar to that of 

 the present. The general configuration of the surface, however, was 

 rough. There were deep-cut gorges, in the bottom of which flowed 

 the streams. The uplands were diversified with projecting rock cliffs, 

 about whose bases was accumulated the waste of many centuries. The 

 only boulders that could be found were such of the fallen clifl-masses 

 as had not yet decayed. The soils were light and fine, resulting from 

 the disintegration of the rocks. They were sandy, or in some places 

 clayey, depending on the conditions of drainage. There were 

 extended tablelands, sometimes rising bench after bench one above the 

 other. In the Archean areas there were peaks of granite and of 

 gneiss that rose more irregularly above the general surface. Amongst 

 these granitic knobs and along the bases of the terraced tablelands, 

 the streams meandered with about the same crookedness as those of 

 to-day, but with greater agreement with the boundary lines separating 

 the different formations. They followed prevailingly the erosible 

 outcropping edges of the softer formations, and when they passed from 

 one formation to another they were likely to form local lakelets, or 

 cascades, or larger waterfalls, and these waterfalls receded up their 



