134 



SCIENCE. 



|Voi.. 11., No. 2B. 



injustice to the. reader to give this account in any 

 other language than that of the original. We do 

 this without reluctance, as our object is to convey 

 the most accurate knowledge, rather than pi-oduce a 

 work exclusively of our own composition. All that 

 follows in relation to the whale is selected from the 

 different works of the accurate and philosophical 

 Scoresby." If the critic's edition of Godman has 

 played false with him, as our edition of Scoresby has 

 with us, perhaps he may think it wise to 'cry quits,' 

 and join with us in throwing out of the case the two 

 slippery points. 



It may be proper to add here, that we are familiar 

 with Scoresby's second figure of mysticetus, which is 

 so far improved as to have the 'small' shortened; 

 but unfortunately the first figure, with all its im- 

 perfections, is the one that has been brought down 

 to us through every book on natural history. 



The reference to Bachstrom's figure of nordcaper 

 is obscure. 



It matters not what that figure is ; it was regarded 

 as one of nordcaper by Cuvier ; and he, in comparison 

 with the old figures of mysticetus, which we claim 

 were nearer true than Scoresby's in general propor- 

 tion, wisely admitted two species. 



They were both, as we have said, about equally 

 incorrect; yet they both had certain features that 

 agreed with the descriptions of the two forms. The 

 nordcaper had been described in nearly the same 

 terms by various authors, great stress being laid on 

 its slenderness and mobility. Scoresby now presents 

 his figure, which, instead of being bulky, with a very 

 short ' small,' or caudal region, and a head one-third 

 the total, had quite nearly the proportions of the 

 figure of Bachstrom, received by Cuvier as that of 

 nordcaper, and with no other specific feature to dis- 

 tinguish them. 



The mention of inaccuTacies, seen near the close of 

 the criticism, is not wholly free frorn error; for ex- 

 ample: the citation touching Col. Hamilton and the 

 Naturalists' library is exactly correct, yet it is noticed 

 as one of the errors that render the historical resume 

 ' seriously defective and misleading.' We are now 

 willing to rest this showing, trusting to the facts 

 herfjn referred to for our vindication in the face of 

 this grave charge. J. B. Holder. 



Fortunately for Dr. Holder, he did not state directly 

 and unequivocally that the St. Lawrence whale was 

 a Balaena; but he occupies several pages in trying 

 to explain away the obvious discrepancies in the way 

 of such an identification and in offsetting them with 

 th& possibilities \n its favor, leaving the reader with 

 the conviction that the specimen is cited as, in Dr. 

 Holder's opinion, an instance of the occurrence of a 

 Balaena in the St. Lawrence near Quebec. Indeed, 

 he goes so far as to say, " and the second example 

 [the one here in question] . . . shows that the largest 

 of the right whales [Balaena] have really found their 

 way as far up a fresh-water stream as Quebec and 

 Montreal " (p. 116). Again he says, " This example 

 is valuable for record, 1°, as a specimen of unusual 

 size; 2"^, as one of great age; 3°, as one out of 

 its usual habitat in so far as to be quite within fresh 

 water" (p. 115). From the context, the point in 

 doubt seems to be, not whether the species is a Ba- 

 laena, but whether it is B. cisarctica or B. mysticetus ; 

 and the whole tenor of the argument (for such it 

 really is) is fairly open to only this construction, what- 

 ever may have been intended. In evidence that my 

 criticism on this poiut is not groundless, or due to 

 perversity on my part, I may cite Mr. F. W. True's 



notice (Scient. lit. gossip, i. 72) of Dr. Holder's 

 memoir, where the same criticism is made. 



As to other points, I will take space to say merely 

 that I regret to notice that Dr. Holder forgets to tell 

 us where Scoresby got his drawings, which, he (Dr. 

 Holder) informs us, ' were evidently ill-consiilered 

 and taken at second hand,' and to ask for proof that 

 Col. Hamilton wrote the 'Cetacea' of Jardine's ' Natu- 

 ralists' library.' The copies of the work I have seen 

 are anonymous, but the work is accredited by Gray 

 and other cetologists to Jardine; and some time since, 

 I took pains to satisfy myself that Jardine was the 

 author. As to Godman, I confess to having done 

 him injustice in overlooking his credit to Scoresby, 

 which my friend Dr. Holder appears to have unfor- 

 tunately only recently discovered; otherwise, doubt- 

 less my stricture on this point would not have been 

 called out. J. A. Allen. 



The Ainos of Japan. 



On p. 307 of Science, D. P. Penhallow objects to 

 my statement of the number of Ainos. It is rather 

 surprising how little he heeds what I said. The 

 numbers he gives are official; i.e., he gives the num- 

 ber of Ainos known to the Japanese government. 

 Therefore he reaches the surprising result, that, _ 

 with the exception of the Ainos brought over from 

 Saglialien (now about 800), there are but 200 in all the 

 province of Ischicari. That province is about as 

 large ?.s Hitaka (according to Penhallow, with 5,000 

 to 6,000). 



Penhallow gives the Aino population in Kitami, 

 Kushiro, Tokachi, and Teshiwo as ranging from 350 

 to 1,500 in each, when it is well known that they are 

 full of Ainos, as any one travelling there will see, their 

 villages being thickly scattered along the coast and 

 the banks of all the larger rivers. I should estimate 

 from those seen at such points that there must be 

 more than 50,000 Ainos in all. Taking Penhallow' s 

 figures for Iburi and Hitaka as correct, and assum- 

 ing that the four provinces named above must have 

 as many Ainos as Hitaka, we should have about 

 26,000 in these five. Granting that Ischicari, Shiri- 

 beshi, and Nemuro have also been taken as much too 

 thickly populated, still we must give them 4,000 

 more than Penhallow allows; i.e., about 6,000. 



Now add to them Penhallow's number for Iburi, 

 nearly 4,000, and the small remnant of Oshima, 

 (Penhallow, 250), and lastly for Chishima (not 

 Chisuma) or the Kuriles a minimum of 750, we get 

 33,000 as the minimum for Yezo. Saghalien having 

 10,000 to 12,000, and South Kamtchalka 5,000 to 

 6,000 (perhaps less), there cannot be fewer than 

 50,000 Ainos altogether. D. Bkauns. 



The Iroquois. 



A close study of the Mohawks of Quebec province, 

 Canada, after the plan and in the service of the Bu- 

 reau of ethnology, reveals several facts hitherto un- 

 noticed in the various histories of the Iroquois. 



Isolated by the early Jesuit fathers from their for- 

 mer Pagan friends and surroundings, every trace of 

 their old folk-lore and of their Pagan customs has 

 disappeared. The division and nomenclature of their 

 gentes differ materially from those of any of the other 

 tribes, and present an interesting field of inquiry. 

 The Mohawk gentes, as given by Morgan, are the 

 wolf, bear, and turtle. Among the Mohawks at Oka, 

 we find, in addition to those, the lark and the eel, 

 while at Caughnawaga they are the bear, wolf, calu- 

 met, rock, lark, turtle, and dove. 



Among the wampum belts of this tribe is a very 

 fine one, upon which the calumet is figured in white 



