November 29, 1907] 



SCIENCE 



759 



write the " b " a " v," as they so often did, 

 and finally the " v " would be pronounced as a 

 " V " in English, and " Havasupa " or " pai " 

 would result. It is also probable that some 

 of the people would contract the full name as 

 is often done in Amerindian languages ; for 

 example, the Pai Ute name for Major Powell 

 was " Cah-parats " the " cah " being a contrac- 

 tion of " cotch," no, and the whole meaning 

 " No-arm " and referring to the fact that 

 Powell had but one arm. 



It would therefore seem permissible to con- 

 tract Ahabasugapa, in the interest of euphony 

 and simplicity to Hahasupa, and I would sug- 

 gest that this spelling be substituted for the 

 incorrect one now in use, and for the further 

 corruption " Supai." The canyon in which 

 they live should then be " Habasu " instead of 

 Supai. The canyon was formerly generally 

 known as Cataract, because of the several 

 beautiful waterfalls there, but as there is on 

 the Colorado Eiver a larger and more im- 

 portant canyon called Cataract, Habasu is a 

 better name for the one where the Hahasupa 

 live. 



The other name applied to these people, I 

 conclude, should be spelled " Cohonino " when 

 it is used. It seems to be the Moki name for 

 them and Voth (1905) spells it Kohonino, 

 while Jacob Hamblin, who visited the Moki 

 frequently from 1857 down, always pronounced 

 the name Cohonino. 



F. S. Dellenbaugh 



7 West 43d Street, 

 New York, 



September 25, 1907 



THE PROLIFICNESS OF THE ENGLISH SPARROW 



While collecting the eggs of the English 

 sparrow, early last May, in Syracuse, IST. T., 

 for embryological purposes, I was able to gain 

 some idea of the remarkable prolificness of 

 that ubiquitous little pest. 



Mounted upon a bicycle, I accompanied, for 

 a little more than two hours, an electric-light 

 " trimmer " (similarly mounted) on his 

 rounds. During this time forty-five lamps 

 were visited, and in every lamp an English 

 sparrow's nest was found. The lamps were of 

 the common type of street arc light, with a 



metal hood that made an excellent nesting 

 place. 



The trimmer said he never bothered to tear 

 out the nests, as they would be rebuilt before 

 his next round. That this was probably true 

 was illustrated, in one ease, where, after col- 

 lecting the eggs, the man pulled out a handful 

 of straws and feathers from the nest and 

 threw them from the top of the pole to the 

 ground; before it had reached the ground one 

 of these feathers had been caught by the 

 female bird, who was ready, apparently, to 

 immediately begin the process of reconstruc- 

 tion. 



While there was a nest in every lamp visited, 

 all of the nests did not, of course, contain 

 eggs ; a few, though very few, of the nests were 

 empty, and a number of them contained young 

 birds which were not counted. 



From forty-five nests one hundred and 

 twenty-eight eggs were obtained, an average 

 of nearly three eggs for each nest; therefore, 

 in the eleven hundred arc-lights of the city of 

 Syracuse there were, probably, more than three 

 thousand eggs. If the number of young birds 

 also had been counted the total number would 

 have been largely increased — and this was 

 only one brood. 



Of the eggs collected only two or three per 

 cent., possibly less, were infertile, so that there 

 must be a fortunately heavy mortality among 

 the young and adult sparrows or their nimaber 

 would be even greater than it already is. 



While the arc-lights furnish the most com- 

 mon and easily accessible nesting places, there 

 are, as is well known, hundreds of other 

 places, so that the number of eggs of any one 

 brood is much greater than the figure given 

 above. 



The greatest number of eggs found in any 

 one nest was seven; the smallest number was 

 two, though this was probably due to the fact 

 that the full number of eggs had not yet been 

 laid. The usual number of eggs per nest was 

 five; more than three fifths of the nests that 

 contained any eggs at all contained that num- 

 ber. 



A. M. Reese 



West Vikginia Universitt 



