152 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXIX. No. 734 



of observances regarding the killing of the 

 bear. While all the eastern Algonkins have 

 observances of this order, they seem to have 

 become much more elaborated among the 

 Eastern Cree. 



Pottery was unknown, steatite taking its 

 place. Semilunar knives, here used as 

 scrapers, other knives and some arrow points 

 were rubbed out from slate. In some parts, at 

 least, arrow points seem to have been chipped; 

 and in others, made of bone and antler. The 

 grooved axe was used. Basketry, except 

 simple vessels of birch or pine bark, was un- 

 known. Birch bark canoes were used. 



Syllabics, invented by missionaries, are now 

 used for communication in their own lan- 

 guage, though the Cree still employ mnemonic 

 devices of their own invention for the same 

 purpose. Information was obtained which 

 seemed to show that in olden times pictorial 

 writings on birch bark, similar to those found 

 among the Ojibways, were known. The 

 primitive form of art seems to have been 

 painting, and the lines employed were geo- 

 metric. 



Little folk-lore was collected, and this was, 

 in the main, typically Algonkin, but some ap- 

 parently resembles the Esquimau. 



A comparison of the writer's notes with 

 Lucien M. Turner's account of " The Nenenot 

 or ' Naskopie ' " Indians,* and conference with 

 Indians and white men who had been in the 

 Naskapi country, seems to show that the cul- 

 ture of these people is identical with that of 

 the old Cree. Considering the absence of agri- 

 culture, the lack of village life and clan sys- 

 tems, the loose social and political organiza- 

 tion, the absence of pottery and the ordinary 

 forms of fabrics, and the comparative differ- 

 ence of artifacts in general, as here noted — it 

 may perhaps be well no longer to consider the 

 region inhabited by the Eastern Cree and the 

 Naskapi as belonging to the Eastern Woodland 

 culture area, a region characterized through- 

 out by its agricultural and village life, its 

 comparatively highly developed social and 

 political organization, its pottery, clothing 



• Lucien M. Turner, " Ethnology of the Ungava 

 District," Eleventh Annual Report, Bureau of 

 Ethnology, 1889-90, pp. 167-350. 



made from skins tanned without the hair, 

 fabrics, woven basketry, and the like. Dr. 

 Frank G. Speck, of the Department of Arche- 

 ology of the University of Pennsylvania, who 

 spent last summer among the Montagnais of 

 Lake St. Johns, arrived independently at the 

 same conclusion in studying these people. It 

 is the suggestion of the virriter, then, that the 

 culture of the region of Subarctic Eastern 

 America inhabited by the Cree, Naskapi, and 

 Montagnais, might better be known hereafter 

 as the Eastern Subarctic, or Labradorean, 

 cultural area, as it is apparently so different 

 from the eastern woodland area with which it 

 has hitherto been classed. 



Alanson Skinneb 

 American Museum oe Natubal Histobt 



TEE AMERICAN ASSOCIATION FOR THE 



ADVANCEMENT OF SCIENCE 



SECTION A— MATHEMATICS AND 



ASTRONOMY 



Compabatpvely few papers on pure mathe- 

 matics appeared on the program of Section A 

 in view of the fact that the American Mathe- 

 matical Society held its annual meeting in affilia- 

 tion with the association. The address of the 

 retiring vice-president. President E. O. Lovett, 

 the Rice Institute, Houston, Texas, was read by 

 the secretary of the section. It was entitled " The 

 Problem of Several Bodies, Recent Progress in its 

 Solution," and an abstract of it has appeared in 

 a recent number of Science. 



The following members of the section were 

 elected as fellows of the association: David R. 

 Allen, Joseph Allen, R. B. Allen, Harriet W. 

 Bigelow, Oskar Bolza, W. H. Bussey, B. E. Carter, 



E. P. Chandler, Abraham Cohen, E. H. Comstock, 

 H. A. Converse, S. A. Corey, J. A. Cragwall, 



F. F. Decker, C. 0. Engberg, F. C. Ferry, F. E. 

 Fowle, Philip Fox, William Gillespie, C. C. Gore, 

 C. 0. Gunther, U. S. Hanna, A. E. Haynes, Alfred 

 Hume, W. J. Hussey, Kurt Laves, A. H. McDougall, 

 Max Mason, Frank E. Miller, J. S. Miller, W. F. 

 Osgood, J. M. Page, M. T. Peed, James Pierpont, 

 S. C. Reese, W. J. Rusk, P. L. Saurel, G. T. Sellew, 

 E. B. Skinner, A. 6. Smith, D. E. Smith, P. F. 

 Smith, Joel Stebbins, R. P. Stephens, L. B. 

 Stewart, H. D. Thompson, E. B. Van Vleck, 

 Oswald 'Veblen, H. S. White, F. S. Woods. 



The sectional committee of Section A nomi- 

 nated the following members of the association, 



