308 
owing to the depth of water and configuration 
of the bottom between the western Aleutian 
Islands and Asia no land connection could have 
taken place there. That even man could have 
crossed at this point on the ice was also out 
of the question, as the pack ice rarely reached 
even the easternmost islands of the chain. The 
speaker spoke of the conditions under which the 
excrement of the Mammoth was found in the 
body of land ice about Kotzebue Sound, as this 
showed that the animal actually traveled over 
the ice now in place. The water of Bering 
Strait was stated to be so shallow that it might 
readily have been filled with ice during the 
glacial period, and the Mammoth might have 
crossed over this ice bridge. 
F. VY. Coville discussed the character and 
distribution of the vegetation of the adjacent 
regions, stating that the absence of trees, com- 
mon to the adjacent portions of Asia and 
North America, showed that there could have 
been no recent land communication of any long 
duration. The smaller plants pointed to a 
brief recent union of the continents. — 
L. Stejneger said that the genus Alligator of 
the southern United States also occurred in 
Asia, and the nearest relatives of the hell- 
bender, Cryptobranchus, of the eastern United 
States were the giant salamanders of Japan 
and western Asia, and that these facts indicate 
an old land connection of long duration. The 
existence of a circumpolar fauna, which had 
been lightly treated by previous speakers, also 
appeared to Dr. Stejneger to corroborate the evi- 
dence of the reptiles and batrachians. 
F. A. Lucas. 
ANTHROPOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON. 
THE 812th meeting was held on January 
29th. 
Dr. George M. Kober exhibited an antique 
German clock which he collected in Hesse 
Darmstadt. This clock, though only 125 years 
old, is closely patterned after the clock of 
Henry de Wyck (1364). 
W J McGee gave an interesting account of his 
explorations in Sonora, Mexico, andin Southern 
Arizona. The search for the Tepoca Indians, 
relatives of the Seri, which was the principal 
object of the expedition, proved futile, the Te- 
SCIENCE. 
[N. 8S. Vou. XIII. No. 321. 
pocas recently having disappeared from their 
former location. Mr. McGee also visited the 
Cocopas living on the tide flats near the mouth 
of the Colorado in an isolated locality. It was 
observed that the Cocopas are not fishermen, 
though their situation offers great advantages 
for that pursuit. They practise agriculture in 
a primitive manner and make use of few intro- 
duced plants. These Indians are declining 
rapidly in number, the chief cause stated by 
Mr. McGee being the adoption of European 
clothing. Mr. McGee during this expedition 
found along the Colorado a new method of pic- 
ture writing, pebbles having been removed 
from an even gravelly surface to form various 
designs. 
Owing to the illness of the President, Pro- 
fessor W. H. Holmes, the exhibition and un- 
wrapping of a Peruvian mummy by Professor 
Holmes and Walter Hough was postponed. 
Major Powell’s important paper on ‘ Phi- 
lology’ occupied the greater part of the evening 
and was discussed by Albert S. Gatschet and 
Alice C. Fletcher. The paper is the fourth of 
a series of five on Demonomy, or human activ- 
ities. Major Powell in a closely reasoned paper 
treated of language under the heads of emotional 
language, oral language, gesture language, 
written language and logistic language. His 
treatment of emotional language was especially 
attractive. He insisted that languages were 
formerly more numerous than now, the ten- 
dency being toward coalescence. 
At the close of the paper the discussion was 
participated in by P. B. Pierce, Rev. Henry 
M. Baum, J. H. McCormick and W J McGee. 
WALTER HouGu. 
CHEMICAL SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON. 
THE regular meeting was held on Janu- 
ary 10, 1901. The following officers were 
elected for the ensuing year: President, Mr. V. 
K. Chestnut ; Vice-Presidents, Dr. W. F. Hille- 
brand, Dr. F. K. Cameron; Secretary, Mr. L. | 
S. Munson; Treasurer, Mr. F. P. Dewey ; Ad- 
ditional Members of the Executive Committee, 
Dr. H. N. Stokes, Dr. H. C. Bolton, Mr. E. E. 
Ewell, Mr. L. M. Tolman. 
WILLIAM H. Krue, 
Secretary. 
