February 22, 1894] 



NA TURE 



399 



collections of the leading countries of Europe, has grown pain- 

 fully obvious. Imporiant colleciions made in America ol the 

 objects illustrating the vanishing life of its own native races of 

 men and animals — collections which can never be made a^ain, 

 and never be replaced — are being permanently withdrawn to 

 enrich the museums of Europe. This has already gone so far 

 that it is necessary in order to study the past life of the Missis- 

 sippi Valley to come to Entiland, while for thai of southern Alaska 

 Americans must go to Berlin, and for the Californian coast ihey 

 have tojjoto Paiis, and so on. It is already then, in European 

 capitals more than in those of the United Siates, that the most im- 

 portant characteristics of the American races have to be studied, 

 and at the present rate, within a few more years, when ihe Ameri- 

 can coliecior has nothing more left to gather and to hell abroad, 

 it will be in Europe, and not in America, that the student of 

 past American history must seek for nearly everything that 

 liost fully illustrates the ancient life and peoples of the American 

 continent. 



The Bureau of Ethnology. 



As during previous years, the work of the Bureau of Eth- 

 nology has been conducted with special reference to the 

 American Indians in their primitive condition, with a view of 

 securing the largest possible amount of information, bo h in the 

 form of recoids for print and in the form of material objects for 

 preservation and future study in the National Museum. 



One of the most interesting questions ever raised concerning 

 the early peoples of America relates to the artificial mounds 

 scattered abundantly over the Mississippi Valley, and with less 

 abundance over most of the United States. Many investigators 

 havegivenatientiontotheseworksof avanished race; and itcame 

 to be a general opinion that the builders of the mounds were a 

 distinct people antedating the native races found in possession 

 of the land on the advent of the Europeans. Within the last 

 five years extended surveys of the mound territory have been 

 made by collaborators ot the Bureau under immediate instruc- 

 tions from the director and by Ur. Cyrus Thomas. An elaborate 

 report on this subject has been prepared during the year, and is 

 now in press. It is the uniied opinion of the officers of the 

 Bureau that this document contains the s dution to the mystery 

 of the mounds ; very greatly to the surprise of the investigators 

 who began the work, they have been led to believe that the 

 mounds and the art products contained therein are in no wise 

 distinct from the works of the modern Indians, and thit the 

 distribution of tribes can now be studied from the mounds them- 

 selves as well as from other aboriginal records. 



Many other important investigations have been carried on, 

 one ofihe chief being the means of interchanging ideas among 

 the American Indians, including gesture, speech, and picture 

 writing, as well as spoken language. The primitive modes of 

 expression by means of gestures or pantomime, and by means of 



j glyphs or pictures, are held by students as of special interest in 



j that they represent the beginnings of language. 



i Smithsonian International Exchange Service. 



As an illustration of the extent of this special part of the 



Institution's activities, it may be stated that it has now about 



I 24,000 active correspondents, of whom 14,000 are in Europe, 



I 200 in Africa, 500 in Australia, and about 9000 in the variou- 



countries of the Western Hemisphere. In the course of this 



; work, the Institution has gathered at Washington an im- 



I mense collection of books, found nowhere el>e to so great 



I an extent, bearing chiefly upon discovery and invention, which, 



with others, now occupy nearly 300,000 titles. Over 100 tons 



of books passed through the exchange office during the fiscal 



year 1892-93, and while the service is used almost exclusively 



for the transmission of printed matter of a scientific nature, 



natural history specimens having no commercial value are 



occasionally transmitted under special permission, when they 



cannot be conveniently forwarded by the ordinary means of 



I conveyance. 



I The National Zoological Park appears to be in a satisfactory 

 ;condition, and fulfils the chief purpose for which it was made, 

 iviz. to keep from extinction species of American animals, 

 jseveral of which are now upon the point of vanishing from the 

 ilace of the earth, and would vanish for ever if something were 

 jnot done to preserve them. 



j In conclusion we must say that the report covers so many 

 ;branches of science, and so much has been done to advance 

 feach of them, that in the above abstract it has only been possible 



i vo. I £69. VOL. 49 i 



to mention a few of the investigations. Sufficient has been 

 said, however, to show that considerable contributions to know- 

 ledge have been made. 



THE GREENLAND EXPEDITION OF THE 

 BERLIN GEOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY. 

 "PARTICULAR inteiest is f<.lt by ihe Geographical Society 

 of Berlin in ihe re-ults of an txpediiion t'l the norih of 

 Greenland, which h y fitted out some two y<-ars ago. At the 

 sitting of the Socieiy hrld on November 4, 1893, Dr. Erich von 

 Diygalski and Dr. E. Vanhotfen communicated papers on the 

 work ol the expedition, Di. Diygalski giving a geneial account 

 of their life in Gre< niand. 



On June 27, 1892, they reached Umanak, a Dani-h colony on 

 the shores of Nonh Greenland, and selected as iheir base of 

 operations a position some distance inland at ihe hear! ol the 

 Umanak Kjoid. They placed iheir house in ihe hollow of a 

 great ice-cirque. East and vtesi were ihe icr-^iream- ol ihe Great 

 and Lesser Karajak, behind ihem stretched he l>are expanse of 

 the ice-sheet of ihe in'erior. in Iront lay the open waitr of the 

 narrow fiord. Dr. Stade had charge of ihe meieon h gical 

 station; Dr. Drjgslski and Dr. VanliofTen made journeys mto 

 the interior and along coasial re^i^n^ 01 glacier and moinit e. 



Ai first, wht-n ihey ascended ihe Kaiajak, none ol the Green- 

 landers were willing 10 acconqiany iheni, as the) are full of 

 superstitions about the ict-wastes of the interior. Thiec ulti- 

 mately consented, and overcame their fears »■■ far as 10 enter 

 will spirit into the difficulties of the tour. Bamboo canes were 

 fixed as marks in the ice, and the " inteiference area " --ludied 

 where the upper ice of the Karajak streams meets the inlai d ice. 

 In the winter mon:hs, Dr. Drygalski, with two tiusiy Gieen- 

 landeis, explored the Gieat KarHJak glacier. He look m- asure 

 ments on the relative rate of movement 111 the smoo her and 

 more cleft parts of ihe glacier. He tells how, as the big blocks 

 of icetumbled down, fine ice-dust w as raised, which hui g like a 

 transparent veil around the ice-pillars and hummoiks, ^ome- 

 limes catching the sun-rays and glancing with colour effects. 

 Ice-grottoes were found, the remnants of old wau r-channel 

 in those the temperature was vi'onderfully high, and the ice-wa 

 quite moist. 



From February until June, Dr. Drygalski and Dr. Vanhoffen 

 were engaged in a long sleigh journty to the most northerly 

 part of the Upernivik colony, in Lat. N. 73°. Ai this latitude 

 the outer margin of the great ice mantle of the interior ex- 

 tended to the sea level. Another toui which they ai'^mp ted in 

 June had to be given up on account of the warm Fo m wind. 

 Before their final departure fn m Karajak, they ascended the 

 ice once more lo take observations on the bamboo maiks pre- 

 viously set. Dr. Drygalski attributes the movement of the ice- 

 streams to their content of water, and says there would be no 

 motion whatever unless the melting temperature were rea. hed. 

 Farther, the increase of temfieraiure in summer, due to the 

 downward passage of heated surface-water, is much gieaierihan 

 the decrease of temperature in v\ inter. The warming effect of the 

 water is at its maximum in the deepest layers of ice. where also 

 the movement is most marked. Microscopic examination of 

 the ice also proved that it was iho oi'ghly penetrated with 

 water. It will be some time bef )re ihe expediii>n can publish 

 their results in detail. Dr. Vanhoffen's work was mainly- 

 biological. 



THE SUN-SPOT PERIOD AND THE WEST 

 INDIAN RA IN t ALL. 



THE irregularities of the rainfall from year to year are so large 

 that apparently there is no connection whatever between the 

 sun-spot period and the Jamaica or any oiher rainfall ; but 

 if we smooth down these irregularities by taking the mean 

 for three years as the rainfall for 'he middle of tho-e yea^s — 

 that is to say. if we take the mean of the rainfall during 1S66, 1867, 

 and 1868 as applying to the middle of 1 867, the mean of the rainfall 

 during 1867, 1868, and 1869 as applying to the middle of 1S68, 

 and so on — we shall then set a -eries which rises to a maximum 

 about the time of a solar minimum, and which falls to a 

 minimum about the time of a solar maximum. 



It is now a'lout a year ayo since ihis connection was found 

 between the sun-spot period and the Jamaica rainfall, and my- 

 article on the subject appeared in the journal of the Jamaica 

 Institute, No. 5. 



