Nov. 22, 1883] 



NA TURE 



83 



manure and ammonia salts) p. pratensis gave 22-67 per 

 cent, of the total produce, and /-". trivialis only 0'64 ; on 

 plot 14 (mineral manure and nitrate of sodai P. trivialis 

 gave 2476, and /'. pratt'iisis only 2'57 per cent. It is 

 suggested that the relatively shallow-rooting P. trii'ialis 

 predommates on the nitrate plots by reason of its fine 

 surface-roots arresting and taking up the nitrate before it 

 has had time to penetrate too deeply ; this plant invari- 

 ably makes rapid growth upon the application of the 

 nitrate of soda in the spring. 



The remaining portion of the memoir is devoted to a 

 discussion of the botany of each separate plot in each 

 season of complete botanical separation, and is carried 

 out with the same elaborate detail as the earlier portion. 

 No one can read this memoir without being impressed 

 with the great power, too frequently overlooked, pos- 

 sessed by the subterranean members of the plant body in 

 deciding the struggle for existence ; much of the inter- 

 necine warfare is carried on in the dark. 



It is quite possible, and indeed probable, that, had a 

 similar series of experiments been simultaneously carried 

 out in another part of England with a slightly different 

 climate, and on a different kind of soil, the results might 

 have differed, but only in slight details. Such a splendid 

 series of experiments on grass land has never before 

 been consummated, and the memoir embodying the results 

 will well repay the most careful study and perusal not 

 only of the agriculturist, but of the botanist, the chemist, 

 and the evolutionist. It may perhaps be long before the 

 great lessons learnt in Rothamsted Park have filtered 

 down to those to whom they should be of most practical 

 value, but we do not despair of a time coming when the 

 intelligent manuring of grass lands for very specific ob- 

 jects will form a part of ordinary agricultural practice. 

 Those who will put their hands to the plough in the field 

 of agricultural research must be content to trudge along, 

 laboriously and unnoticed, in the furrow. Their disco- 

 veries cannot be made in a week, or a month, as are 

 many in electricity or in chemistry, but, like those at 

 Rothamsted, which are now in their twenty-eighth year, 

 and are still going on, they can only be looked for, even 

 after the expenditure of much thought and of unflagging 

 industry and perseverance, as "the long result of time." 



VV. Fream 



PALEOLITHIC MAN— HIS BEAD 

 ORNAMENTS 



ppVERY one who has noticed the objects found in 

 -'--' caves of Paleolithic date knows the evidence which 

 supports the idea that cave men wore bracelets and neck- 

 laces, but the evidence that the older river-drift men wore 

 similar ornaments is more obscure. Still, when one 

 notices the extreme beauty and precision of make of some 

 Palaeolithic implements, one cannot help surmising that 

 the more ancient savages of our old river sides also had 

 sufficient personal pride and ideas of ornament to some- 

 times decorate their bodies with beads in a similar fashion 

 with the cave dwellers. 



Dr. Rigollot (" Mc'moire sur des Instruments en Silex," 

 p. 16) refers to the well-known foraminiferous fossil from 

 the chalk — Cosciiiopora g/ot://aris, D'Orb. (sometimes 

 found in river gravels with Palaeolithic implements), as 

 beads probably used by Palsolithic men ; and Sir Charles 

 Lyell (" Antiquity of Man," p. 119) says : " Dr. RigoUot's 

 argument in favour of their having been used as neck- 

 laces and bracelets, appears to me a sound one. He says 

 (Dr. Rigollot) he often found small groups of them in one 

 place — just as if, when swept into the river's bed by a 

 flood, the bond which united them together remained un- 

 broken." iMr. James Wyatt of Bedford, in describing 

 these bead-like fossils {Geologist, 1862, p. 234), says he 

 had examined more than two hundred specimens, and on 



making sections of some of them he saw markings which 

 appeared to indicate " drilling with a tool after the object 

 was fossilised." In specimens from the chalk the hole 

 through the fossil, though commonly straight, exhibits 

 of course no artificial drilling but shows the structure of 

 the foraminifer. 



I am not aware of any confirmation hitherto made of 

 the two curious observations noted above, but so little is 

 at present known of the habits of river-drift men that the 

 following notes may prove of some interest. Where there 

 is so much darkness the slightest glimmer of new light is 

 welcome. 



After long searching for the Coscinopora at Bedford 

 without result, I lighted on many examples at Kempston 

 in iSSo. In this year I found in a few days over two 

 hundred examples ; they occurred with unabradcd imple- 

 ments and flakes and carbonised vegetable remains. 

 After this date the Coscinopora again ceased, and from 

 then till now I have met with but few examples. The 

 finding of the above-mentioned large number of speci- 

 mens all congregated tegether appeared to lend some 

 confirmation to Dr. RigoUot's view, for it seems unreason- 

 able to believe that so large a number could by any 

 natural possibility find a position in one place in any river 

 gravel. 



As my examples were found at Bedford, at a place 

 where Mr. Wyatt must at one time also have found a 

 considerable number, I naturally examined the specimens 

 carefully to see if I could trace any artificial drilling or 

 enlargement of the natural hole. I speedily noticed that 

 the surface round each orifice in many of the beads was 

 abraded as if by the constant contact of the bead next on 

 a string. A few of the beads also had the hole artificially 

 enlarged, sometimes at both ends, as at section A, some- 

 times in the middle, as at the section B, and sometimes 

 at one end only, as at the section c. The dotted lines in 

 these illustrations show the original natural orifice, the 

 solid lines near the dotted ones show the enlargement by 

 artificial drilling. The illustrations are all actual size. 

 In most of the instances the drilling appears compara- 

 tively fresh, in others less so, but it must be remembered 

 that the implements found with them were mostly una- 

 braded, and vegetable remains were found. These speci- 

 mens were found by myself. They were not touched or 

 manipulated by the workmen. Other examples of these 

 beads had one end near the orifice broken away as if in 

 an attempt to enlarge the opening by breaking the sub- 

 stance of the fossil away as at D, E, F. 



Whilst looking through the fallen material in the pit, 

 the piece of naturally perforated fossil shell, illustrated 

 actual size at G, attracted my attention. The hole is 

 probably due to a shell-boring moUusk, but when I saw 

 the object in the drift I distinctly noticed that a black 

 substance entered at one side of the hole and emerged at 

 the other ; at the moment of picking the object up, this 

 material fell to dust with part of the very friable surface 

 of the fossil shell. 



Some of the beads (as seen in section at H, j, K, l) also 

 bore very distinct traces of a similar black substance 

 within the orifice, although not seen till the sand and part 

 of the black substance itself had fallen out. This black 

 material I took to be the remains of part of the ligament 

 on which the beads were originally strung by their Palaeo- 

 lithic owner, and with this idea in mind I sent some to 

 an analytical chemist, who examined the material for me 

 with the following result : — 



" The testing lor nitrogenous organic matters, of which 

 animal tissues are composed, was tested in the same 

 manner as testing water tor such matter, that is, by con- 

 verting it into ammonia; precautions were of course 

 taken to eliminate from the results any ammonia already 

 existing. The amount of ammonia was strikingly evident 

 and showed with each bead examined separately. The 

 blackening of the organic matter in the holes of the beads 



