December 12, 1902.] 



SCIENCE. 



947 



Jittle doubt that their assumption as to the 

 late, possibly Pliocene, age of these beds is 

 •correct, though it can only be proved by fur- 

 ther and paleontological evidence, but this 

 ■decision is merely an equivalent of the ideas 

 above cited from Hilgard, and therefore not 

 new. 



That the Pascagoula horizon is Miocene 

 rather than Pliocene is probable from the 

 ■character of its scanty fauna, which is not 

 of the sub-tropical type of the Pliocene of 

 our southern coast, but indicates a cooler 

 temperature, such as prevailed during the 

 Miocene of that region. 



The very great difficulties which the south- 

 ■ern coastal plain offers to geological study are 

 sufficient excuse for the slow progress which 

 has been made, but it cannot be too often 

 ■emphasized that no determination of the age 

 of its beds not based on their fauna, or the 

 fauna of beds both above and below those in 

 question, can be regarded as more than tenta- 

 tive ; and such determinations in the past have 

 ■almost invariably proved erroneous. 



Wm. H. Dall. 



the squids from onondaga lake, n. y. 

 A FEW days since the newspapers told a 

 story of how a citizen of Syracuse, while 

 drawing a net in Onondaga Lake, got a 

 strange looking fish, which upon being 

 "brought to Professor John D. Wilson, a well- 

 Icnown teacher of science in the cit.y, was 

 pronounced a squid. Professor Wilson has 

 followed up this discovery, lest perchance 

 ■some one connected with the affair were not 

 too wise to be mistaken or too honest to de- 

 ceive, and he assures me that he and his sci- 

 entific friends are satisfied of the genuineness 

 of this find. Professor Wilson learned from 

 Mr. Terry, the discoverer, that he caught the 

 creature in a net while fishing for minnows 

 in shallow water. A second specimen was 

 afterward found at the same place by a Mr. 

 Xang who keeps a restaurant on the iron pier 

 at the southeast corner of the lake. Both, 

 as I understand, were caught alive. The -first 

 specimen was cooked (!) and then put in 

 alcohol, the second is now in possession of the 

 ■writer. The whole story makes a ' devilish 



fishy ' first impression. Should there be no 

 reason to doubt the verity of the discovery, 

 its bearings are most suggestive. The place 

 where the squids were found. Professor Wil- 

 son says, is just where the first salt springs 

 were discovered and the first salt made in the 

 Syracuse region by the early settlers long be- 

 fore salt wells were bored. Onondaga Lake 

 is a shallow body resting on the Salina shales 

 and unquestionably receiving at all times a 

 considerable amount of saline seepage from 

 the rocks below; for all we know to the con- 

 trary its bottom layers may be decidedly 

 saline. These squids are not to be at once 

 cast out as a ' fake ' simply because they are 

 marine animals alleged to have been caught 

 in a fresh-water lake. Too many similar 

 occurrences are known at the present to 

 justify such procedure. There was a time 

 in post-glacial history when there was com- 

 munication from this body of water to the 

 sea by the way of the St. Lawrence valley. 

 It is within the limits of possibility that at 

 such a time marine animals entered the pres- 

 ent basin of Onondaga Lake as they did that 

 of Lake Ghamplain. and that the saline con- 

 dition of the lake waters has permitted their 

 existence till the present. If such a presump- 

 tion can be verified it will be by additional 

 discoveries of these creatures supplemented 

 by expert zoological determination of the 

 specific characters and possible variations of 

 these specimens, so that this discovery may 

 prove to have a very important paleontologic 

 bearing. Professor Wilson calls attention 

 further to the fact that there are several 

 hotels about the edge of the lake from which 

 oyster and clam shells are thrown into the 

 lake waters, but it hardly seems that this fact 

 opens a possibility for the introduction by 

 this means of the eggs of one of our Atlantic 

 squids into conditions which would permit 

 of their hatching. There are a number of 

 considerations to be carefully weighed before 

 the genuineness of this discovery can be ac- 

 cepted ; if it is the work of some wag, he has 

 shown acuteness in selecting Onondaga Lake 

 rather than any other of the lakes of New 

 York state. As very much, perhaps all, will 

 depend upon the determinations of the zool- 



