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NATURE 



[October 15, 1891 



Mr. Clement L. Walker, while carrying on geological 

 work in South-Western New Mexico, has also been pursuing 

 archaeological researches in that most interesting region during 

 the last two years. He proposes to publish a detailed account 

 of his investigations, and in the meantime he briefly records 

 some of them in the August number of the American Naturalist, 

 On the east, west, and middle branches of the Gila River, in 

 the Mogollon Mountains, there is an extremely rough, wild, 

 and broken tract ; and here, in the rugged cliffs, are found 

 great numbers of ancient cliff-dwellings. Mr. Webster devoted 

 considerable time to the study of these dwellings, making plans 

 and sketches, and copying the drawings of many of the more 

 interesting and extensive hieroglyphics painted on the rocks. 

 One of these ancient pueblos of the cliff-dwellers is situated in 

 a lofty cliff which forms the side of a deep, narrow canon 

 extending out from the west branch of the Gila. This cliff- 

 dwellers' village is in a fine state of preservation, and consists 

 of upwards of twenty-eight rooms. Among the relics obtained 

 in the rooms were specimens of several kinds of cloth, all made 

 from the fibre of the Spanish dagger, matting of bear-grass, 

 willow-work, sandals, cords of various sizes, feather-work, a ball 

 and large skein of twine of the same material as the cloth, 

 human and animal bones, stone utensils, great quantities of 

 corn-cobs, corn, squash or pumpkin rinds, seeds and stems, 

 corn-husks, beans, gourds, pottery, braided human hair of a 

 brown colour, &c. ; and last, but by no means least, a perfectly 

 preserved cliff-dweller mummy. This was a mummy of a small 

 child, with soft brown hair, similar to that found braided, only 

 finer. It was closely wrapped in a considerable amount of two 

 varieties of coarse cloth, woven from the fibre of the Spanish 

 dagger, then wrapped in a large nicely-woven mat of bear-grass, 

 and tied on by cords of the same material as the cloth to a small 

 curiously-shaped board of cotton-wood. 



Some fine caves have lately been discovered near Southport, 

 Tasmania, At the meeting of the Royal Society of Tasmania 

 in June, an account of them was given by Mr. Morton, who had 

 visited them. They are situated about four miles from Ida Bay, 

 and a fairly good road leads to them. The entrance is through 

 a limestone formation. A strong stream flows along the floor of 

 the chambers. The first chamber reached by Mr. Morton and 

 those who accompanied him showed some fine stalactites, and 

 along the floor some fine stalagmites were seen. On the lights 

 carried by the party being extinguished, the ceiling and sides of 

 the caves seemed studded with diamonds, an effect due to 

 millions of glow-worms hanging to the sides of the walls and from 

 the ceilings. Further on, several chambers were explored, each 

 revealing grander sights. The time at disposal being limited, 

 the party had to return after traversing a distance of about three- 

 quarters of a mile, but from what was observed the caves evi- 

 dently extended a distance of three or four miles. The only 

 living creatures seen were the glow-worms. These caves, under 

 proper supervision, should become, Mr. Morton thinks, one of 

 the great attractions of the south of Tasmania. 



In the Quarterly Statement of the Palestine Exploration Fund, 

 it is announced that the first volume of the ' ' Survey of Eastern 

 Palestine," by Major Conder, has been issued to subscribers. It 

 is accompanied by a map of the portion of country surveyed, 

 special plans, and upwards of 350 drawings of ruins, tombs, 

 dolmens, stone circles, inscriptions, &c. It is also announced 

 that the new map of Palestine, so long in hand, is now ready. 

 This map represents both sides of the Jordan, and extends from 

 Baalbek in the north, to Kadesh Bamea in the south. 



Mr. E. R. Morse contributes to the October number of the 



Engineering Magazine, a periodical issued at New York, an 



interesting paper on marble quarrying in the United States. 



Within recent years the use of American marble both in 



NO. II 46, VOL. 44] 



cemeteries and in buildings has become very extensive. Various 

 foreign marbles, such as the African Red, Belgium Black, and 

 Mexican Onyx, are employed in the interior decoration of 

 buildings ; but only Italian marble can be said to come really 

 into competition with the American product, and the importa- 

 tion of this stone into the United States amounts only to about 

 one-sixth of the value of the marble produced and sold at home. 

 The quarrying of marble is practically limited at present to 

 Tennessee, Georgia, Maryland, New York, Massachusetts, and 

 Vermont. Large and valuable deposits may exist elsewhere, 

 but the expense of testing deposits is so great, and the chances 

 that the product of new quarries may prove unsaleable are so 

 numerous, that Mr. Morse thinks that new marble fields are not 

 likely to be developed soon. 



The " basking shark " {Selache maxima, L. ) is apparently no 

 very uncommon visitor in New Zealand waters. In the new 

 volume of the Transactions and Proceedings of the New Zealand 

 Institute, Mr. T. [F. Cheeseman, Curator of the Auckland 

 Museum, describes a specimen, over 34 feet long, which was 

 stranded near the mouth of the Wade River. Mr. R. H. 

 Shakspere, of Whangaparaoa, who saw the specimen very 

 shortly after it was stranded, has informed Mr. Cheeseman that 

 every spring several individuals of the same species can be seen 

 near the entrance of the Wade River, and along the shores of 

 Whangaparaoa Peninsula. He believes that they visit these 

 localities in search of their food, which he thinks is composed of 

 small Meduscz and other pelagic organisms. They can be easily 

 recognized from their habit of swimming on the surface of the 

 water, a portion of the back and the huge dorsal fin being 

 usually exposed. It is from this circumstance, taken with the 

 fact that their motions are very often slow and sluggish, that 

 they have received the name of the "basking shark." They 

 are easily approached and harpooned, and on the west coast of 

 Ireland as many as five hundred have been taken in a single 

 season. The liver often weighs as much as two tons, yielding 

 six to eight barrels of oil. A few years ago, when sharks' oil 

 was of greater value than it is at present, the oil from a single 

 full-sized specimen would often realize from ^^40 to ;^5o. 



At the meeting of the Linnean Society of New South Wales, 

 on June 29, Mr. Froggatt exhibited some living beetles (fam. 

 CurculionidcE), which afford a good example of protective 

 coloration. They were found at Wellington, N.S.W., on the 

 trunks of Kurrajong trees {Sterculia), the bark of which they 

 resemble so closely in tint and general appearance that it was 

 quite by accident Mr. Froggatt first recognized their true 

 character, 



Messrs. Gauthier-Villars have sent us the •' Annuaire " 

 for 1 89 1 of the Municipal Observatory of Montsouris. It con- 

 tains, as usual, a great mass of carefully selected and well 

 arranged information. We may especially note a collection of 

 old meteorological observations made at Paris, and the following 

 papers : .Parisian climatology, by M. Leon Descroix ; chemi- 

 cal analysis of the air and of waters, by M. Albert Levy ; 

 thirteenth memoir on organic dust in the air and in waters, by 

 Dr. Miquel. 



Messrs. G, L, English and Co., New York, have found it 

 necessary to issue a supplement to the catalogue of minerals 

 which they published in June 1890. So great has been the 

 demand for minerals that they had three collectors at work 

 during the summer— one in Europe, another in the south- 

 western part of the United States and in Mexico, and a third ia 

 Colorado. 



The new number of the Journal of [Anatomy and Physiology 

 opens with some' valuable notes [by Dr. R. Havelock Charles, 

 on the craniometryjfof some of the outcaste tribes of the 



