350 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XVII. No. 426. 



of Japan. The translation is interesting, not 

 only as settling a fact of importance, but as 

 indicating the alertness of the Japanese mind 

 in prosecuting scientific inquiry. The article 

 is from the Zigi-shimpo of November 5, 1902. 

 G. Frederick Wright. 

 Obeeun Cot.t.f.ge, 

 February 4, 1903. 



Nobody has ever foimd a trace of a glacier 

 in our country, and in fact it has often been 

 doubted that one existed in Japan. Professor 

 Milne, of England, who once held a chair in 

 the Imperial University of Tokyo, even went 

 so far as to deny its existence in Japan. It 

 is, therefore, interesting to learn that Pro- 

 fessor Yamazaki, of the Higher Normal 

 School of Tokyo, recently found a trace of 

 one on a mountain side in Shinano. When 

 he was interviewed, he gave the following 

 accounts of his discovery: 



" The fact that America and Europe were 

 once covered with ice is now beyond dispute; 

 and recently we heard that traces of a glacier 

 were found in Australia; and I have always 

 held a theory that Japan is qualified to have 

 a glacier, for the following reasons. 



" 1. There are several mountains as high as 

 and above 3,000 meters. 



" 2. Many of them are covered with perpet- 

 ual snow. 



" 3. The climate, being ' oceanic,' the amount 

 of rain and snow is greater here than it is in 

 Europe. 



" 4. In America, I found that the glacier 

 region comes as far south as the lowest ex- 

 tremity of 37' 60" N. L. Now, Tokyo being 

 on 35' 41" N. L., the middle part of the island 

 along the coast of the Japan Sea corresponds 

 with the glacier region in America. 



" I had held this as a mere theory until last 

 August, when I actually found traces of a 

 glacier in one of the northwestern mountains. 



" Last August, as a Committee on the 

 * Prevention of the Earthquake Disasters,' I 

 climbed up a volcano, located on the boun- 

 dary of three countries, Shinano, Yetchu and 

 Yechigo; and when making investigations in 

 Hida range, I actually fell upon a trace of 

 a glacier on the side of Shira-Umaga-Take. 

 This place, which is 2,900 meters above the 



sea, forms a sort of valley, extending, say, 

 for about 200 yards, and the layer of snow 

 is about 20 yards deep. The sides of the 

 valley are composed of slate-rock and sand. 

 Pebbles and pieces of rock found on the 

 mountain are unlike those which we generally 

 find in ordinary mountains — smooth and stri- 

 ated. The rocks along the snow line are 

 marked with grooves and the rock-floor is 

 marked by the grinding work done by a gla- 

 cier. In a still lower part of the valley, 

 further down, I found stones and rocks tra- 

 versed in every direction. I have found suf- 

 ficient evidence to form a belief that here we 

 have the proof of the existence of a glacier 

 in Japan. The erosion is effected by the ice 

 pressing against the sides, as it crept along, 

 taking sand and stones which feU from the 

 sides. If we should follow the range up to 

 the province of Hida, I believe, we should 

 find more valuable proof of the existence of 

 glaciers. At any rate, we certainly have suf- 

 ficient proof now for clearing the' doubt of 

 the existence of glaciers in this country. 



"It is a strange coincidence, but a few 

 days later. Professor Yabe found a zone of 

 vegetation like that of the Alps and Chish- 

 ima, in the very same place." — As he was in- 

 terviewed by the editor of Zigi-shimpo. 



November 5, 1902. 



SHOBTJEB ARTICLES. 

 TYPES OF PRE-LINNjEAN GENERA. 



Instability in the application of generic 

 names is undoubtedly the most serious re- 

 maining deficiency of our current systems of 

 biological taxonomy. To secure stability of 

 specific names a definite rule of priority was 

 sufficient because it had occurred to nobody- 

 to deny that the specimen first named and 

 described should constitute the type of the 

 species and determine the application of the 

 specific name. With genera also stability is 

 not to be secured merely by observing priority 

 of dates, since it is necessary that writers 

 agree upon the application of a name as well 

 as upon its age; but by treating each generic 

 name as inseparably attached to a single spe- 

 cies as its nomenclatorial type, the law of 



