816 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXX. No. 779 



dealt with his experiences in the field. Many in- 

 teresting forms were observed and collected, some 

 of which the speaker exhibited. 



L. HusSAKor, 



Secretary 

 American Museum of Natural History 



THE anthropological SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON 



At the 435th regular meeting of the society, 

 held October 26, 1909, the president. Dr. J. Walter 

 Fewkes, spoke on " The Preservation of Cliff- 

 dwellings," his remarks being illustrated with 

 lantern slides. 



" The preservation of cliff-dwellings," said the 

 speaker, " is one aspect of a more comprehensive 

 problem now attracting great attention, the con- 

 servation of our resources. The protection of the 

 antiquities of our country is imperative, for if 

 neglected much valuable material pertaining to 

 prehistoric America will be destroyed by the ele- 

 ments or by vandals in a few years." Excavation 

 and repair of cliff-dwellings are necessary not 

 only to put these interesting relics of the past in 

 such condition that tourists may obtain correct 

 ideas of this type of prehistoric architecture but 

 also to furnish students with data for compara- 

 tive studies. 



The two cliff-dwellings that already have been 

 repaired by the government are Spruce-tree House 

 and Cliff Palace, both of which ruins are situated 

 in the Mesa Verde National Park, Colorado. 



The field work of repair of cliff-houses under 

 direction of the Secretary of the Interior was in 

 charge of Dr. Fewkes, who was detailed for that 

 work by the secretary of the Smithsonian Insti- 

 tution. The treatment of these ruins consisted 

 of excavation and repair. The ideal is educational 

 and no restoration was attempted. No changes 

 were made in the skylines of the walls, the pur- 

 pose of the work being to preserve as far as pos- 

 sible the picturesque characters of the ruins. The 

 condition of Spruce-tree House and Cliff Palace 

 before and after the operations was illustrated by 

 lantern slides made from photographs taken from 

 approximately the same places. The speaker 

 pointed out the many diflaculties encountered in 

 the field work, as isolation of the ruins, scarcity 

 of water and inaccessibility of the ruins from the 

 top of the mesa. He dwelt especially on the mag- 

 nitude of the work at Cliff Palace, the largest 

 cliff-dwelling in the southwest, and on the dis- 

 covery of buried terraces having retaining walls 

 and ceremonial rooms in the talus in front of the 

 secular rooms. 



Both Spruce-tree House and Cliff Palace have 

 been completely excavated and repaired so that a 

 visitor can now walk without difficulty or danger 

 from one end to the other through deserted courts, 

 plazas and rooms, and readily examine all archi- 

 tectural features. All walls in danger of falling 

 have been repaired and new foundations provided 

 wherever necessary. 



Dr. Fewkes also threw on the screen views of 

 the large cliff-dwellings lately discovered in the 

 Navaho National Monument in the neighborhood 

 of Marsh Pass, northern Arizona. While the 

 dimensions of some of these cliff-dwellings are not 

 less than those of Cliff Palace, they lack the 

 picturesqueness and the fine masonry of the latter. 

 The Navaho Monument cliff-dwellings are rarely 

 more than two stories high and most of the cere- 

 monial rooms are rectangular. These buildings 

 are, however, among the best preserved in the 

 southwest and their chambers might be called 

 more appropriately abandoned rooms rather than 

 ruins, the broom being in many cases more neces- 

 sary than the spade to put them in condition for 

 tourists and students. It is fortunate for his- 

 torical science that these houses are now protected 

 from vandals and it is to be hoped that their 

 walls, some of which are tottering, will be re- 

 paired before it is too late. 



John R. Swanton, 



Secretary 



THE WASHINGTON CHEMICAL SOCIETY 



The 193d meeting of the Washington Chemical 

 Society was held at the George Washington Uni- 

 versity, on Thursday, November 11, 1909. Presi- 

 dent Walker presided. The papers presented 

 were: " The Role of Water in Minerals," by W. F. 

 Hillebrand, and " The Exact Determination of 

 Sulphur," by J. Johnston. 



The election of officers for 1910 resulted as 

 follows : 



President — G. H. Failyer. 



First Vice-president — W. W. Skinner. 



Second Vice-president — J. M. Bell. 



Secretary — J. A. LeClerc. 



Treasurer — F. P. Dewey. 



Councilors — E. T. Allen, P. H. Walker, L. M. 

 Tolman. 



Members of the Executive Committee — ^M. X. 

 Sullivan, H. C. P. Weber, H. E. Patten, S. S. 

 Voorhees. 



The attendance was 106. 



J. A. LeClerc 



Secretary 



