630 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXXVI. No. 932 



map of about two hundred and fifty square 

 miles. This work was done under the direc- 

 tion of Dr. W. W. Atwood and in conformity 

 as far as possible with the official methods of 

 the United States Geological Survey. 



Mr. r. H. Sterns, of the class of 1909 

 Oberlin College, has been employed by the 

 Peabody Museum of Harvard University to 

 explore an interesting class of prehistoric vil- 

 lage sites in eastern Nebraska. A large por- 

 tion of the archeological specimens collected 

 by the exploration have been presented to the 

 Geological Museum at Oberlin. Mr. Sterns 

 worked in Sarpy County, Nebraska, south of 

 Omaha. The sites evidently belong to a very 

 early stage of Indian occupation and until 

 Mr. Stems's researches were either unob- 

 served or misinterpreted. They occupied cir- 

 cular depressions popularly supposed to be 

 " buffalo wallows," and thought by Professor 

 Barbour to be the original shape of the sites. 

 It turned out, however, that the structures 

 were square, and that the depressions had as- 

 sumed their present shape from the deposition 

 of silt, brought in by winds and storms. The 

 collection, which is now being unpacked in the 

 Oberlin Geological Museum, consists of flint 

 and jasper scrapers, knives, arrow heads and 

 the cores from which they had been broken, 

 besides various forms of grooved and polished 

 axes, together with a great variety ^ of orna- 

 ments. Some of the arrow shaft smoothers are 

 made from pumice stone which Mr. Sterns 

 concludes has floated down the Missouri River 

 from Montana. The collection constitutes 

 one of the most valuable additions in recent 

 years to Oberlin's already large and valuable 

 . archeological material. 



In the entire population of the United 

 States illiteracy has declined from 10.7 in 

 1900 to 7.7 per cent, in 1910, but among chil- 

 dren 10 to 14 years of age the decline in the 

 10 years was from 7.2 to 4.1 per cent. These 

 facts appear in a statement in regard to the 

 illiteracy of children issued by Director 

 Durand, of the Bureau of the Census, De- 

 partment of Commerce and Labor. The fig- 

 ures are based upon tabulations prepared by 



W. C. Hunt, chief statistician for population. 

 The general decline of illiteracy marks the 

 improvement of educational opportunities 

 throughout the country, and this improve- 

 ment is most distinctly measured in compar- 

 ing the children who have just passed through 

 the schools. Generally speaking, each succes- 

 sive generation in the United States shows a 

 smaller proportion of persons unable to read 

 and write, and this proportion is always least 

 for the children 10 to 14 years of age. Illiter- 

 acy is therefore considerably less for children 

 than for the aggregate population. In 1910 

 the whole number of children of the ages 10 

 to 14 years who were unable to read and 

 write was 370,120, of whom 144,659 were 

 white and 218,355 negroes, leaving 7,106 

 among Indians, Chinese and Japanese. Il- 

 literacy among the native white children has 

 fallen to 1.7 per cent., and among those of for- 

 eign or mixed parentage who for the most 

 part live in cities, the proportion is as low as 

 0.6 per cent. On the other hand, as many as 

 18.9 per cent, of negro children are illiterate. 

 In all classes of the population a marked im- 

 provement is noted in comparison with the 

 census of 1900. Illiteracy among white chil- 

 dren has fallen from 3.5 to 1.8 per cent., and 

 among the negroes from 30.1 to 18.9 per cent. 

 These figures show that illiteracy in the 

 United States is being gradually eliminated, 

 and that when the present generation of chil- 

 dren grows up to manhood and womanhood 

 illiteracy in the United States, especially 

 among the white population, will be no greater 

 than in the most advanced countries of Eu- 

 rope. This striking diminution in illiteracy 

 among children in the last 10 years is found 

 in all parts of the United States, and in the 

 northern part of the country such illiteracy 

 has almost entirely disappeared, as in this 

 section of the country the proportion is con- 

 siderably less than one per cent, of the whole 

 number of children. 



The Registrar-General in his annual sum- 

 mary for 1911, as summarized in the London 

 Times, states that in England and Wales the 

 marriages registered last year numbered 274,- 

 577, corresponding to a rate of 15.2 persons 



