Apkil 24, 1896.] 



SCIENCE. 



625 



•esting references to the researches in which 

 the institution is engaged. 



The most noteworthy relates to the ex- 

 ploration of the ancient city of Copan, Hon- 

 duras. A wonderful stairway has been dis- 

 covered, twenty-four feet in width, and 

 leading to the summit of a pyramid over 

 one hundred feet in height. It is built of 

 massive blocks of stone, the front of each of 

 the steps being covered with deeply-cut 

 hieroglyphs and delineations of the human 

 form. When once restored and copied, we 

 may indeed find on it, as the report says, 

 " the most important hieroglyphic inscrip- 

 tion in Central America." 



A curious addition to the Museum is the 

 only ancient New England bow in exist- 

 ence. It is five feet seven inches in length, 

 being much longer than has generally been 

 stated. The Hemenway collection from 

 the Salt River valley has been deposited in 

 the Museum by the executors and arranged 

 by Dr. J. Walter Fewkes. About twelve 

 students are studying in the department 

 under the direction of Professor F. W. 

 Putnam and his assistant. Dr. Dorsej'. 



THE ALLEGED TERTIARY MAN OF BURMAH. 



Considerable attention was attracted 

 early last year by the assertion of Dr. 

 Noetling, repeated in various periodicals, 

 that he had discovered in a miocene laj'er, 

 on the banks of the IiTawadi river, rude 

 flint implements of ' palaeolithic' patterns. 

 Later in the year he announced that the 

 strata were not miocene, but certainly plio- 

 cene, and therefore tertiary man was still 

 saved. 



Another geologist, Mr. Oldham, in Natu- 

 ral Science, September, 1895, questioned the 

 occurrence of the flints in the original de- 

 posit. It appears that the face of the out- 

 crop has a veneer of mud washed down 

 from the super-incumbent strata, adherent 

 to its ferruginous surface, and that the 

 chipped flints are found in this coating. 



Just such ' implements' are scattered over 

 the plateau above, and would naturally be 

 washed down with the surface soil in heavy 

 rains. 



This demonstration seems to relegate the 

 Burmese find to that region of extreme 

 doubtfulness in which at present every al- 

 leged discovery of tertiary man in Europe 

 or America rests. 



RACIAL DEGENERACY IN AMERICA. 



A WELL prepared article on this subject is 

 contributed to the University Medical 3Iagazine, 

 January, 1896, by Dr. Albert S. Ashmead. 

 He reviews the prevalence of goitre, cre- 

 tinism, leprosy and dwarf stature in Amer- 

 ica as factors in ethnic physical and psychi- 

 cal degeneration. In his survey he includes 

 the native as well as the immigrant Ameri- 

 can and African races, and collects a large 

 amount of references on the subject. On 

 the whole, it cannot be said that he has 

 shown any special tendency of humanity 

 in the New World to retrogressive trans- 

 formation or racial pathology. The causes 

 to which he alludes are frequent in the 

 other continents with like effects. 



What would be especially desirable in 

 this direction would be a study of the white 

 race in the United States in isolated locali- 

 ties where its members have been subjected 

 to the environment for a hundred years or 

 more with little access of crossings from 

 without. Undoubtedly, important modifi- 

 cations have taken place, but they have not 

 yet been critically collected. 



PSYCHOLOGICAL NOTES. 



THE SENSE OF EQUILIBRIUM. 



Interesting experiments are reported in 

 the Biologisches Centralblatt by Bethe on the 

 connection between the sense of equilibrium 

 and the semi-circular canals. He finds that 

 doves are not well adapted to exhibiting 

 this connection ; he allows dead doves with 

 their wings distended by wires, to fall 



