440 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXIX. No. 741 



" The Chemical Constituents of Oil of Erigeron 

 and Wild Sage," by Frank Rabak. 



"China Wood Oil," by E. W. Boughton. 

 J. A. Le Glekc, 



Secretary 



THE ANTHBOPOLOGICAL SOCIETY OP WASHINGTON 



At the 428th regular meeting of the Society, 

 held at the Cosmos Club February 2, 1909, the 

 following program was presented: 

 A 'Newly Discovered Siouan Dialect: Dr. John K. 



SWANTON. 



Dr. Swanton visited the small remnant of 

 Tunica Indians living close to Marksville, La., in 

 November, 1908, for the purpose of correcting and 

 amplifying the linguistic material recorded by 

 Dr. Gatschet over twenty years ago. In the 

 course of his investigations he had the good for- 

 time to find a single survivor of an Indian tribe 

 formerly living on the Yazoo River and known 

 from French accounts as Offogoula. A sufficient 

 vocabulary was obtained to show that the lan- 

 guage spoken by them was not Muskhogean, as 

 had hitherto been supposed, but a Siouan dialect 

 related to those of the Biloxi and the eastern 

 Siouan tribes. It is peculiar in substituting f 

 for s in many situations and tc for y in others. 

 The proper name of the tribe is Ofo, and prob- 

 ably has nothing to do with Choctaw ofe, "dog," 

 as has hitherto been supposed. 

 Exhibition of Ethnographic Specimens by Mem- 

 bers of the Society. 



Dr. I. M. Casanowicz exhibited a silver lamp 

 with eight burners used by the Jews in the 

 Hanuga ceremony, the origin of which was ex- 

 plained at some length. This lamp is the prop- 

 erty of Ephraim Benguiat, of New York. Dr. 

 Casanowiez also showed a design representing a 

 globe made of the book of Ecclesiastes in Hebrew 

 characters in a single line. 



Mr. Edwin P. Upham, of the Smithsonian In- 

 stitution, exhibited and gave the place of origin 

 of a series of stone scrapers and a series of stone 

 axes. A general examination and discussion fol- 

 lowed on the part of the members of the society. 

 John R. Swanton, 



Secretary 



the biological and geological section of the 

 academy of science and art 

 of pittsbueg 

 At a regular meeting of the section on Feb- 

 ruary 2, Mr. F. G. Clapp spoke on the " Influence 



of Geological Structure on the Occurrence of Oil 

 and Gas." Mr. Clapp briefly discussed the " anti- 

 clinal theory " of White and Orton and indi- 

 cated the other factors which must always be 

 considered in connection with it in order to make 

 determinations of practical value. The following 

 generalizations were made in regard to the fields 

 of southwestern Pennsylvania and northern West 

 Virginia : 



1. All conditions being favorable, the accumu- 

 lations of oil and gas do show a definite rela- 

 tion to the geologic structure. 



2. With but few exceptions the greatest elon- 

 gation of the pools is approximately parallel to 

 the axes of the folds. 



3. When both oil and gas are present in a 

 stratum of sandstone, they are distributed ac- 

 cording to their densities, the oil in the lower 

 and the gas in the higher portion of the layer. 



4. When oil and salt water are present the oil 

 generally occurs in the part of the stratum lying 

 directly above the water level. 



5. When salt water is absent the oil may oc- 

 cur at the bottom of the syncline, or may be part 

 way up the anticlinal slope. 



6. Oil may occur on a " structural bench," where 

 the dip of a stratum changes from gentle to steep. 



7. Gas occurs mainly near the crests of anti- 

 clinal folds. 



8. It occurs, however, in greatest volume im 

 certain portions of the anticlinal crests which 

 take the form of structural " domes." 



9. Gas occurs in volume also at many widely 

 scattered points, due to local changes in the dip 

 and texture of the rocks. 



The unconformity at the base of the Pottsville 

 formation was briefly described, and the state- 

 ment made that in certain fields it has a decided 

 influence on the relation existing between the 

 position of the oil and gas deposits and the geo- 

 logical structure as determined by the surface 

 rocks. In general the interval between the sur- 

 face rocks and the deeper oil and gas " sands " 

 diminishes toward the north and west, and this 

 change frequently shifts the axes of the anti- 

 clines and synclines in the deeper sands a frac- 

 tion of a mile from the position of the same axes 

 in the surface formations. Other changes in the 

 intervals between the various sands must be 

 taken into account in locating oil or gas deposits. 

 Percy E. Raymond, 



Secretary 



