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SCIENCE. 



[Vol. XVIII No 456 



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COTTON-SEED MEA.L IN THE DAIRY RATION. 



In bulletin No. 14 of the Texas Experiment Station is reported 

 a series of experiments made to determine the influence of 

 cotton seed meal in the dairy ration on the creaming of milk, 

 both by the common or gravity method and the centrifugal 

 method. 



In these experiments, cows were tested in lots containing sev- 

 eral cows each, the cows in the contrasted lots being in as uniform 

 a condition with respect to milb-flow, time from calving, etc., as 

 it was possible to arrange them. The feed for each pair of con- 

 trasted lots was the same, except that one lot received equal parts 

 of corn-meal and brau as bye food, while the other lot had cotton- 

 seed mpal and bran in equal parts. 



In tlie case of two lots of five cows each that were far advanced 

 in milk (100 to 124 days on the average) it was. found that where 

 the cream was raised by gravity at the ordinary summer temper- 

 ature, the milk being set at about 70° in Fairlamb cans and 

 skimmed when sour (in twelve to twenty-four hours), an average 

 of 18.4 pounds of butter was lost in the skim milk of the cows fed 

 on cotton- seed meal for every liundred pounds present in the milk 

 set, as againt 30.9 pounds lost when no cotton-seed or cotton-seed 

 meal was fed. 



In the case of two lots of four cows each, less advanced in 

 milk (88 to 93 days) the loss of butter-fat in the skim milk on the 

 cotton-seed meal ration was 23.7 pounds out of every hundred 

 pounds actually present in the original milk, against 31.8 pounds 

 lost when no cotton-seed meal was used. 



In the case of two lots of three cows each that averaged but 

 fifty days from calving at the beginning of the test, the loss was 

 11.3 pounds on cottonseed meal ration, against 14.9 pounds when 

 no cotton-seed was fed. 



The average loss on cotton-seed meal for ordinary setting was 

 therefore 17.5 pounds out of every hundred pounds present in the 

 original milk, against 25. 8 pounds lost when no cotton-seed meal 

 was fed. 



Where the milk of five cows, a hundred and fifty-tvvo days 

 from calving, was set at a temperature of 45°, and kept at this 

 temperatui'e with ice for twenty-four hours and then skimmed, 

 the loss was 37.6 pounds out of every hundred pounds in the orig- 

 inal milk, the cows having no cotton-seed meal; while five cows 

 a hundred and thirty- two days from calving and having cotton- 

 seed meal, lost but 22.9 pounds out of every hundred. When the 

 milk was kept only twelve hours before skimming, the loss with- 



out cotton-seed meal was HA pounds, a2;ain9t 31.7 pounds lost 

 with cotton-seed meal, showing a decided advantage in the longer 

 setting. 



When the cream was extracted by the centrifugal method as 

 soon as uailked, that from four cows, two hundred and ten days 

 from calving, showed a loss of but 1.8 pounds without cotton- 

 seed, and that from four cows, two hundred and eleven days from 

 calving, but 3.3 pounds with cotton-seed meal That from four 

 cows, sixty-two days from calving, and having no cotton-seed, 

 lost 3.27 pounds, and that from four cows, fifty eight days from 

 calving, and having cotton seed, lost 3.3 pounds out of every hun- 

 dred actually present in the whole milk. 



These results show that in the case of centrifugal creaming, a 

 very much larger per cent of the butter-fat present in the milk is 

 obtained, and that without regard to the character of the feed 

 used, whereas in ordinary gravity creaming the character of the 

 food may have a very marked influence upon the quantity of but- 

 ter obtained from the milk. 



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 of the journal. 



Throwing-Sticks. 



In the report of the National Museum for 1884 I published a 

 short paper on the ' ' tbrowing-sticks ' of the Eskimo in the De- 

 partment of Ethnology. The object of this article was to show 

 how the methods and problems of natural history are applicable 

 to the products and apparatus of human industry. Here we had 

 a homogeneous people in blood and language, occupying a zoologi- 

 cal area which we call hyperborean, and stretching out to cover 

 Labrador, Greenland, all Arctic Canada, and the shores of Alaska 

 from the Mackenzie district all round to Mt. St. Elias. It was 

 with genuine pleasure that I afterward received from Dr. Seler, 

 Mr. Murdoch, Dr. Stolpe, Dr. Uhle, Mr. Bahnson, Mrs. Nuttall, 

 and Dr. Mortillet their own later contributions upon the same in- 

 genious implement, with the acknowledgements that their publi- 

 cation was stimulated by the Eskimo paper. (Altmexibanische 

 Wurfbretter, von Dr. Ed. Seler, Internationales Archiv fdr Eth- 

 nographie, t5d. iii., 1890; The History of the " Throwing-stick" 

 which drifted from Alaska to Greenland, by John Murdoch, Am. 

 Anthropologist, July, 1890; Ueber Altmexikanische und siida- 

 merikanische Wui-fbretter, von Dr. Hjalmar Stolpe, in Stockholm, 

 Internal. Archiv f. Ethnog., Bd. iii., 1890; Ueber die Wurf- 

 holzer der Indianer Amerikas, von Dr. Max Uhle, Mittheil. der 

 Anthrop. Gesellsch., in Wien, Bd. xvii., n.f. vii., 1887; Ueber 

 siidameribanische Wurfholzer im Kopenhagener Museum, von 

 Kristian Bahnson, Internal. Archiv f. Ethnog , ii., 1889; Mrs. 

 Zelia Nuttall, in a paper read before the Woman's Anthropological 

 Society in Washington, entitled The Atlatl or Spear-Thrower of 

 the Ancient Mexicans, Arch, and Ethnol. Papers of the Peabody 

 Museum, i,. No. 3; Les Propulseurs a crochet Modernes et 

 Prehistoriques, Part A., drien de Mortillet, Rev. Mensuelle de 

 I'EcoIe d'Anthropologie de Paris, i., 15 Aout, 1891.) 



In plate xvii. of my paper two very interesting old specimens 

 are described from the Tlingit or. Koloschanaua about Sitka. 

 One of these is figured in Ensign Niblack's monograph (Smithso- 

 nian Report, Part II., 1888, plate xxvii, fig. 157). These specimens 

 are very old, are covered witli totemic devices, and represent a 

 decayed art passed into its mythic stage. I do not now know of 

 any similar device for throwing spears or harpoons until we get to 

 Mexico, where, as is well shown in the works above quoted, the 

 altatl Was one of the commonest weapons. Imagine my great 

 pleasuie, therefore, on receiving from Lake Patzcuaro, hi Mexico, 

 a modern altatl, well worn and old looking, accompanied with a 

 gig for killing ducks. The apparatus was bought from the hunter 

 by Capt. John G. Bourke, U.S.A., and may now be seen in the 

 National Museum. The thrower is two feet three inches long, and 

 has two finger-holes projecting, one from the right and one from 

 the left side. In my paper on the Eskimo stick no case of two 



