TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION H. 621 
(ii) Ethnological Problems of Canada. By Dr. F. Boas. 
After a brief enumeration of some of the gaps in our knowledge, the author 
pointed out that the general outlines of Canadian ethnology had become 
known through reconnaissances carried out largely under the auspices of the 
British Association for the Advancement of Science, and that the task of 
the future would be a systematic study of the ethnological problems of 
the country. He discussed these problems in their relation to the general 
ethnological problems of the American continent. While in the whole 
area, from the Argentine Republic northward to the Great Lakes, certain 
characteristic traits of civilisation are found which differentiate the civil- 
isation of ancient American from those of other continents, distinct types 
of culture are found in the extreme north-west of the continent, including 
the whole area from California to the coast of Labrador, and in the 
extreme south-west in Brazil and Tierra del Fuego. This suggests that 
these marginal areas may possess a culture older than that of the middle 
part of the continent, and not opposed to the same historic influences. 
Among the Canadian tribes only the Iroquois and a few of the southern 
tribes, like the Blackfeet and Assiniboins, belong to the middle area of 
the continent. All the rest belong to the northern marginal area. The 
tribes east of Great Slave Lake and of the northern interior of Labrador 
may represent this civilisation in its present form. The problem becomes 
still more difficult owing to undoubted influences that have extended from 
Asia into America, and which reach Hudson Bay and the Great Plains. 
The unravelling of these historical conditions is perhaps the most im- 
portant problem to be solved by a study of Canadian ethnology. 
Ethnologists are not yet in accord in regard to the theory of the gradual 
development of civilisation. While some believe that similarities of culture 
occurring among diverse tribes, sometimes wide apart, are due to psycho- 
logical similarities, others believe that gradual dissemination has played 
an important part. In Canada there are at least six distinct types of 
culture—that of the Eskimo, the North-West Coast, the Mackenzie 
Barrier and of the western plateaus, that of the Plains, that of the 
eastern woodlands, and that of the Iroquois. The study of the relations 
of these will help to clear up the fundamental anthropological problems, 
which are of great theoretical interest, and which have, also, a direct 
practical bearing upon our views relating to the history and future of our 
own civilisation. 
(iii) The Anthropological Work of the University of Pennsylvania. 
By Dr. G. B. Gorpon. 
Dr. Gordon, in reviewing the researches into the history of man in the 
North American continent that have been carried on under the auspices 
of the Government and institutions of the United States, called attention 
to certain far-reaching changes that have been witnessed in the attitude 
of the educated classes, and especially of learned institutions, with refer- 
ence to those studies that fall directly within the province of anthro- 
pology. These changes are destined to affect very profoundly those inter- 
related branches of learning which, like history and sociology, are more 
directly affected by the anthropological method. These tendencies are 
made manifest by the history of anthropological activities in those quarters 
which are most influential in shaping educational development and methods 
of research. The work of the Bureau of Ethnology has been a prominent 
factor in promoting that interest in the study of the native races which 
has been carried on with successful results by the universities and - 
museums of the country. Nothing in the history of anthropology is more 
