Oct. 9, 1884] 



NA TURE 



577 



convolution in the monkey, and their results filled up a gap in 

 the well-known work of Ferrier in that they were able to show 

 that removal of certain areas, the excitation of which had pre- 

 viously caused movements of muscles of the trunk, &c. , on both 

 sides led to paralysis of muscles of the trunk of such a r degree 

 that the animal was unable to stand. By removal of the frontal 

 lobes no paralysis of voluntary movements were obtained. These 

 results were in opposition to those of Munk, of Berlin. 



Ova of Monotremes. — The President stated that he had a most 

 important announcement to make. He had just received a cable- 

 gram from Sydney, from Prof. Liversidge, announcing that Mr. 

 Caldwell, the Balfour Student, who was sent out to Australia to 

 investigate the mysteries in connection with the mammals of that 

 country, had discovered that the Monotremes were oviparous. 

 He did not consider that a more important telegram in a scientific 

 sense had ever passed through the submarine cables before. The 

 Monotremes formed two families characterised by the duck- 

 billed Platypus and an animal which was known to the Australians 

 as the ant-eater. These were the lowest forms of mammals, and 

 it had never been known how they produced their young. The 

 extraordinary discovery was now made that these mammals laid 

 eggs, and that the development of these eggs bore a close resem- 

 blance to the development of the eggs of the Reptilia. This dis- 

 covery proved that these animals were more closely connected 

 with the Sauropsida than with the Amphibia. 



On Sensory \Nerve-Sacs in the Skin of Amiurus, a Silnroid 

 Fish ; and On the Function of the Air-Bladder in Amiurus, and 

 its Relationship to the Auditory Organ, by Prof. R. Ramsay 

 Wright. — He referred to the numerous species in North Ame- 

 rican fresh waters, and their remarkable uniformity, almost all 

 belonging to one genus, Amiurus, while tropical fresh waters 

 teem with many different genera differing extremely fr m each 

 other in form. All the species, however, live in muddy waters, 

 and, to make up for the want of the powerful eyesight which 

 characterises the salmon, are provided with an exceedingly 

 sensitive skin and with special tactile appendages on the head. 

 The lecturer described the already known forms of sensory organs 

 in the skin, and then pointed out that certain structures recalling 

 the nerve-sacs of ganoid fishes, like the sturgeon and gar-pike, 

 are scattered all over the body from head to tail, and both on 

 the upper and lower surfaces. This diffusion of these organs is 

 of interest as indicating probably an ancient type of their arrange- 

 ment. The second point touched upon was the function of the 

 air-bladder and its relationship to the auditory apparatus. Prof. 

 Wright believes the fish becomes sensible of alterations in the 

 pressure of the surrounding water in the auditory apparatus, and 

 suggested that the air-bladder is also an important channel 

 through which sounds are communicated to the terminal organs 

 of the auditory nerve. 



In the discussion which followed Prof. Alfred Haddon of 

 Dublin confirmed the latter point, and suggested that this 

 particularly delicate apparatus for receiving sounds was present 

 on account of the fact that tropical Siluroids, at any rate, are 

 capable of producing sounds by means of a stridulating apparatus, 

 some forms of which he had himself described. 



Section H— Anthropology 



Mr. Horatio Hale read an interesting paper On the Origin 

 of Wampum. He said that amongst the Indians it represented 

 mammon, or money, and was equally valued. It had once been 

 actually accepted in Massachusetts and New York as legal cur- 

 rency, owing to lack of silver, and was largely used in the Indian 

 trade. Wampum consisted of a kind of bead or shell, but must 

 not be confounded with the cowries of the East. Indians on 

 the sea-coast drove a large trade in this article, and Long 

 Island was a mine of wealth. The word wampum was of 

 Algonquin origin, and meant white. The speaker explained the 

 various uses to which this material was put. It was generally 

 used in strings and belts, and at the great Iroquois ceremonies 

 it was considered indispensable. Black wampum was more 

 valuable than white. Of the many thousands of belts that had 

 been known to exist during the last three centuries, scarcely fifty 

 remained, and Mr. Hale regretted the dull indifference that had 

 been displayed by the Americans with regard to this interesting 

 and valuable material, valuable as forming a chronicle of the 

 tribes who manufactured the b;lts. Mr. Hale exhibited an his- 

 torical belt of wampum, composed of white beads, with four black 

 squares, which, he said, represented four towns. This belt, he said, 



was one hundred and sixty years old. Another and still more 

 remar able belt was also shown by the speaker, who explained 

 the emblems upon it, which, he said, were intended to represent 

 the signs of the Christian religion. There were three crosses 

 representing the Trinity, a lamb, executed in a primitive manner, 

 and a dove. These objects, Mr. Hale said, had been evidently 

 suggested to the Indian artist, who had done his best to represent 

 them, but he said that his artistic powers should not be judged 

 by this specimen. The speaker also displayed some strings of 

 beads, and said that these were used in the Indian chants, the 

 beads recalling certain verses to the singers. Mr. Hale showed 

 to the Section a photograph of some Indian chiefs of the six 

 nations who had met at Brantford and explained to him the 

 meaning of their wampum belts. Shell beads, he said, were 

 used in large quantities by the mound-builders, and he argued 

 that it was probable that the art of manufacturing this medium 

 had descended to the modern tribes from their more advanced 

 ancestors. Some beads, which had been found in an enormous 

 burial-place in Orillia county by Mr. Hirschfelder, were shown 

 by Mr. Hale, who said that these were undoubtedly used by the 

 Hurons. Crossing the Rocky Mountains, he said that wampum 

 would be found in actual use, the material itself and the labour 

 devoted to its ornamentation making it extremely valuable. 

 Being susceptible of a high polish, it forms very handsome 

 ornaments, and is better adapted for this purpose than for cur- 

 rency, for which it is cumbersome. Speaking of the amount of 

 shell money possessed by the primitive Indians, Mr. Hale said 

 that the average man owned about one hundred dollars' worth, 

 that being, he said, about the value of two women, two grizzly 

 bear skins, twenty-five cinnamon bear skins, or three ponies. 

 Mr. Hale remarked on the districts in which wampum was found, 

 and quoted some sentences from a work of his own with regard 

 to the discovery of wampum in the Kingsmill Islands of Micro- 

 nesia in the Pacific Ocean. There, he ^aid, he saw strings of 

 alternate wooden and shell beads. He exhibited to the Section 

 specimens of beads from the Kingsmill Islands and from Cali- 

 fornia, some of these having lost their In tie from the long time 

 which they had been buried in a grave. Mr. Hale made some 

 interesting remarks upon the history of Chinese money or 

 "cash," tracing its origin to the tortoise-shell disks used in 

 earlier times. Mock money, he said, was sometimes burnt at 

 sacrifices, as the Californian Indians burnt their shell money 

 at funerals. He traced the passage of this currency be- 

 tween Asia and America, showing how it could have been 

 brought from one district to another. It was used, he said, by 

 Indians in Eastern North America, those in California, the in- 

 habitants of Micronesia, and the Chinese. He thought that 

 the monetary system was indigenous to China, and that by early 

 intercourse it had been conveyed to this continent. He noticed 

 the fact that Chinese junks and Micronesian prows may have 

 been wrecked on the western shores of America, and that their 

 crews may have introduced the system of shell money amongst 

 the Indians. 



Major J. W. Powell read a paper on The Marriage Laws of 

 the North American Tribes. In the course of his observations, 

 the speaker remarked upon the custom of burying articles with 

 the dead. There were two classes of property amongst the 

 Indians, communal, or that belonging to the tribe, and personal, 

 or that belonging to the individual. In order to prevent 

 controversy the latter was buried with its owner. With regard 

 to the marriage laws, Major Powell said there were many strange 

 customs. For instance, in some tribes, marriages were arranged 

 by officers of the tribe, and the choice of wife or husband was 

 limited to certain groups of persons. Marriage was therefore 

 not by personal choice, but by legal appointment. But marriage 

 could be performed by elopement, or running away, when, if 

 the couple could remain in safety from detection and punish- 

 ment until after the day of jubilee, or the day when all offences 

 are considered forgiven, then that marriage would be considered 

 legal. Wives could also be obtained by trial of battle, a contest 

 of some kind, when the woman became the helpmate of the 

 victor. There was also marriage by capture. The methods of 

 obtaining a wife were so common that the custom of marriage 

 by legal appointment was much neglected. But though this was 

 the legal and proper method, the others had become legalised 

 by long custom, and now the capture, contest, or elopement 

 were merely simulated. 



Mr. C. A. Hirschfelder of Toronto, as representative of the 

 Numismatic and Antiquarian Society of Montreal, read a paper 

 On Prehistoric Remains in Canada. The ancient remains of 



