78 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XXIV. No. 603. 



formation, were considered by the board as 

 a whole to make transformation of this plan 

 essentially not feasible. 



Again, inasmuch as the canal would 

 probably not be complejted and opened 

 within less than ten years on any plan the 

 locks of the minority plan would not be 

 large enough to accommodate ships then 

 afloat if the rate of increase of ships' di- 

 mensions during the past ten years should 

 be nearly reached during the next ten. 



The time estimated by the majority to be 

 required for the building of the sea-level 

 canal is from twelve to thirteen years after 

 making the most abundant allowances for 

 the effects of climate, of the rainy seasons, 

 of the necessary repairs and renewals of 

 plant, of the eight-hour labor day, of the 

 low efficiency of available labor, and with- 

 out working more than one shift of labor 

 within twenty-four hours. It is believed 

 that the investigations of the majority 

 show, however, that there is a reasonable 

 probability of a sea-level canal being 

 opened in from one to two years less time 

 than their estimate. 



The time estimated by the minority as 

 necessary for the construction of their lock 

 plan was ten to eleven years. As the con- 

 struction of this plan involves a much 

 higher grade of labor, and a far larger 

 amount of so-called works of art, such as 

 the locks, involving the making and putting 

 in place of about 3,500,000 cubic yards of 

 concrete, than the sea-level plan, the writer 

 believes that a lock plan with a summit 

 level eighty-five feet above mean tide can 

 be executed in little if any less time than 

 a sea-level plan. 



The recent dreadful earthquake disaster 

 at San Francisco constitutes the gravest 

 warning in human experience of the ad- 

 visability of constructing this canal in such 

 a way as to give it the greatest degree of 

 immunity from the results of any convul- 

 sion of nature. The isthmus of Panama is 



a region of rather frequent earthquakes, 

 but they are not often severe. It would be 

 an act of folly, however, to ignore the les- 

 son of such an appalling catastrophe. The 

 canal which is to be constructed across the 

 Isthmus of Panama should be of such a 

 type as to give the minimum of obstruction, 

 either natural or artificial, the greatest de- 

 gree of safety not only in operation, but 

 from the effects of earthquakes, against the 

 severity of which there is absolutely no in- 

 surance whatever, and the sea-level is the 

 only type which fulfills these imperative 

 requisites. Wm. H, Burb, 



SCIENTIFIC BOOKS. 



Archeological Researches in Costa Rica. By 



C, V. Hartman, Stockholm, Ivar Haegg- 



stroms Boktryckeri, A,B,, 1901, 4°, 195 pp., 



488 text illus., 1 map and LXXXYII pis. 



Museum collections and special publications 



derive their value from the character of the 



field-work on which they are based. It is with 



such material as Mr. Hartman has furnished 



and by means of the methods he employed that 



we may hope to raise American archeology to 



the dignity of a real science. 



In the growth or decay of art, industry, cus- 

 toms, religion, there raust of necessity enter 

 the time element. For this reason, systems 

 of relative chronology play a most important 

 part in prehistoric archeology. A careful, in- 

 telligent, thorough st\idy, therefore, of the con- 

 tents of graves is absolutely indispensable. 

 ' Archeological Researches in Costa Rica ' is 

 by no means confined to a study of burial 

 places, yet it describes fully more than 400 

 graves, 



Mr. Hartman's field investigations were car- 

 ried on during the years 1896-97. He began 

 his researches on the east coast with the great 

 mound and walled enclosure at Mercedes. The 

 mound is about 300 meters west of Rio 

 ISTovillo; is truncated, with diameters at base 

 and top of 30 and 20 meters, respectively. The 

 height, 6.5 m., is the same as that of the sur- 

 rounding wall. The purpose of the mound 

 ' seems to have been to serve as a platform, or 

 temple, for the large statues, which were 



