Mabch 29, 1907] 



SCIENCE. 



515 



these ancient and aberrant whales. These 

 animals as well as the Sirenians from the 

 lower members of this great formation have 

 been known since 1879. In 1898-1901 Messrs. 

 Eeadnell and Andrews discovered a number 

 of land mammals in these marine or littoral 

 beds, and in the latter years a turning point in 

 the history of paleontology was reached by 

 the discovery of Palceomastodon teeth in the 

 upper fluviatile beds. The working of this 

 level between 1901 and 1904 by the Cairo and 

 British Museum parties, and less thoroughly 

 by collectors for other museums, has been 

 principally on a bench 160 meters above sea- 

 level, about 40 meters in thickness, and with 

 a fossiliferous exposure of not over ten miles 

 east and west. Evidence of very thorough 

 prospecting and of excavation on a large scale 

 is everywhere apparent. The bone-bearing 

 stratum is evidently of fluviatile origin, con- 

 sisting of cross-bedded and often brightly 

 colored sands, sometimes intermingled with 

 clay concretions. All can be worked with a 

 light pick and shovel or with tho broad-edged 

 mattox which the natives prefer. Bones are 

 often found broken, more seldom entire; they 

 occur in pockets from 30 to 100 feet in 

 diameter. Several of these pockets or ' bone 

 pits ' are reserved by the Egyptian survey but 

 the privilege to work them further was kindly 

 extended by Director Lyons to the American 

 Museum. The conditions of deposition are 

 altogether unlike anything in the American 

 Western Eocene, but resemble as closely as 

 possible the Lower Pleistocene, Sheridan or 

 Equus Beds of our west. 



While Professor Osbprn and Mr. Ferrar 

 were engaged in a survey of the whole region, 

 simultaneous excavation of two of these 

 ' bone pits ' was begun at once under the 

 direction of Mr. Walter Granger and Mr. 

 George Olsen, of the museum party. It soon 

 became apparent that the six workmen from 

 the Helouan stone quarries who had previously 

 been out for the Cairo and British Museums 

 were too impatient to find large bones and too 

 careless with delicate objects, whereas the 

 twelve workmen from Sakkara entered into 

 the search with great care and intelligence, 

 and although they had never hunted for fossil 



bones before showed an enthusiastic reverence 

 for a delicate object which was delightful to 

 watch as expressed in the display of smiling 

 rows of ivory white teeth at a word of en- 

 couragement. The labor question was solved 

 and the problem now became one of extensive 

 excavation, of handling and removing great 

 quantities of sand, of uncovering and taking 

 up the sometimes firm, sometimes extremely 

 delicate and fragile bones, of keeping a very 

 sharp lookout for small objects, and especially 

 for the smaller animals of the period which 

 have thus far not been discovered. Coarse 

 river-deposited sands are evidently not favor- 

 able for the preservation of very small objects, 

 but very careful methods of search were soon 

 rewarded by the discovery of small jaws of 

 the creodonts or primitive carnivora of the 

 period, and even more interesting rodents, 

 which had hitherto not been found. At 

 the end of ten days the system of stripping 

 and quarrying was thoroughly established and 

 progressing as rapidly as the slower work of 

 treating the bones with solutions of gum 

 arable and shellac could follow. Limb bones, 

 teeth and jaws of Arsinoltherium, Palceo- 

 mastodon, Saghatherium, Ancodus, Pterodon 

 began to appear in encouraging numbers and 

 in fairly good condition. 



The members of the excavating party were 

 ever stimulated by the hope that the much- 

 desired skull of one of these mammals might 

 come to light. Skulls are, however, very rare. 

 Of the primitive elephants only two frag- 

 mentary skulls of Palceomastodon and two of 

 the more primitive Mceritherium have been 

 found after many years' work. One of each 

 was found by accident while surface pros- 

 pecting. Two skulls of Palceomastodon are 

 reported to have been found by a collector who 

 did not understand how to preserve them. Of 

 Arsino'itherium, six skulls have been secured; 

 three of these, all very perfect, are in the 

 Cairo Museum, one in the British, a fifth is 

 in the Stuttgart Museum, a sixth, said to be 

 the largest and finest, was destroyed in transit. 

 Of these six skulls four were found in surface 

 prospects and two in quarrying. 



The region has been so thoroughly pros- 

 pected since 1901 that the chances of easily 



