594 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XVI. No. 406. 



of the specimen first alluded to was not en- 

 tirely due to organic action. 



Samuel T. Hensel. 



bones of a mastodon found. 



Laborers engaged in digging out muck have 

 recently found in a swamp near Newburgh, 

 N. Y., some of the bones of a mastodon. So 

 far, there have been secured the lower jaw, 

 with teeth in place; the teeth of the upper 

 jaw; one tusk; eighteen ribs, or seven com- 

 plete ones and fragments of four others; 

 fifteen sections of the vertebra; bones of the 

 foot ; and what is probably the skull, though in 

 many small fragments. These bones laid at a 

 depth varying from two to eight feet below the 

 surface of the ground, a few in the muck, but 

 most of them in the shell marl that underlies 

 it. The swamp, about two acres in extent, is 

 three quarters of a mile west of the Hudson 

 River, one mile north of the northern limit of 

 the city of Newburgh, and about one hundred 

 and eighty feet above the river level. There 

 is gently rising ground on the north and east, 

 but directly west of the swamp the hills rise 

 quite abruptly to a height of eighty or 

 one hundred feet. The underlying rock be- 

 neath this muck bed appears to have a general 

 slope to the southeast. The muck averages 

 two feet in thickness, below which is marl, 

 varying from a few inches to twelve feet in 

 thickness, and under this, boulders and pebbles 

 that form a s.olid bottom. 



The bones found were scattered over an area 

 about fifty by twenty feet, and in this respect 

 they differ from those of the three mastodons 

 found in Orange County in former years, and 

 which were exhumed in almost the relative 

 places they occupied when the animal was 

 alive. The tusk found is curved, seven feet 

 long and nearly seven inches in diameter at the 

 root, and is in fair condition, though it showed 

 signs of disintegration soon after removal 

 from its resting place. Owing to the accumu- 

 lation of water in the excavation, the progress 

 of finding and removing the bones is very 

 slow; but in a few days it may be possible to 

 announce the finding of some other parts of 

 the skeleton. 



Eeginald Gordon. 



THE AMURWANIST CONGRESS IN NEW 

 YORE. 



The 13th session of the International Con- 

 gress of Americanists will open at noon, 

 Monday, October 20, and continue during the 

 week, in the halls of the American Museum 

 of Natural History. The hotel headquarters 

 will be the Hotel Majestic. Lunch will be 

 served daily at the Museum to all members. 

 Thursday will be devoted to a trip through the 

 parks, and visits to Columbia University, the 

 Botanical Garden and Zoological Garden. More 

 than eighty papers have already been offered 

 to the Congress from nearly all the active 

 students of Americanist subjects. The mem- 

 bership fee is three dollars which entitles one 

 to all of the privileges of the meeting and to 

 the volume of proceedings to be published 

 later. The address of the general secretary 

 is M. H. Saville, American Museum of Natu- 

 ral History, New York. It is expected that a 

 large number of the anthropologists of the 

 country will be present, and among the official 

 foreign delegates are: Professor Dr. Seler, 

 Professor Dr. von der Steiner, of Berlin, rep- 

 resenting Prussia; Professor Dr. Stolfe, of 

 Stockholm, Sweden; Professor Dr. Schmeltz, 

 of Leiden, Holland ; Professor Lejeal, of Paris, 

 France; Alfredo Chavero Chavero, Dr. 

 Leon, Prancisco Belmar, of Mexico; Dr. Pit- 

 tier, Dr. Ferraz, of Costa Rica. After the 

 meeting the foreign guests will be given an 

 excursion to Philadelphia, Washington, Pitts- 

 burg, Cincinnati and Chicago to visit the 

 scientific and educational institutions of those 

 cities. A visit will be made to the ancient 

 fort in Ohio known as Fort Ancient. As this 

 is the first meeting of the Americanist Con- 

 gress in the United States it is hoped that 

 there will be a large attendance of those inter- 

 ested in the work of this organization, namely, 

 to bring together students of the archeology, 

 ethnology and early history of the two Ameri- 

 cas, and by the reading of papers and by dis- 

 cussions to advance knowledge of these sub- 

 jects. 



THE BRITISH AND AMERICAN ASSOCIA- 

 TIONS. 

 Ix its report of the Belfast meeting of the 

 British Association Nature says : 



