May 8, 1903.] 



SCIENCE. 



14:7 



known educator and student of anthropology. 

 The facility has been chosen by the president, 

 and elected to serve indefinitely on good be- 

 havior, instead of being reelected annually as 

 at the Agricultural College. In so young a 

 school much remained for the future, but 

 progress has been steady and satisfactory, and 

 the institution was beginning to amount to 

 something as a scientific center. 



All this is now to be changed. All along 

 there had been attempts within and without 

 the board of regents to effect undesirable 

 changes, but so far it had been possible to 

 suppress them, and the faculty usually heard 

 nothing of them. However, when a member 

 of the board recently resigned because he was 

 leaving New Mexico, Governor Otero ap- 

 pointed for the unexpired term a man who 

 was well known to be hostile to the existing 

 management. After a time it became plain 

 that a destructive policy was intended, and 

 Mr. Springer resigned from the board. The 

 faculty held a meeting to discuss the situa- 

 tion, and sent one of their number to repre- 

 sent the facts to Governor Otero. The gov- 

 ernor, however, offered no relief and plainly 

 intimated that if we resigned there were 

 plenty more where we came from. It was 

 then decided to lay the matter before the pub- 

 lic, and a printed pamphlet was issued, setting 

 forth the conditions in detail. This was well 

 received by the public and the students, the 

 great majority siding with the faculty; the 

 students especially being practically unani- 

 mous, and passing resolutions expressing their 

 opinions. The City Council of Las Vegas also 

 passed resolutions in favor of the faculty. In 

 the face of all this, however. Governor Otero 

 reappointed the regent objected to for a full 

 term, and appointed in Mr. Springer's place 

 one of the regular politicians. In these ac- 

 tions he was supported by the council of the 

 recent New Mexico legislature, which has 

 been exceptionally corrupt and incompetent. 

 Hence the faculty goes. 



t. d. a. cookerell. 



Las Vegas, N. M., 

 April 12, 1903. . 



SHORTER ARTICLES. 



THE USE OF PNEUMATIC TOOLS IN THE PREPARA- 



ATION OP FOSSILS. 



The tedious work of removing fossils from 

 their matrix by means of the hammer, chisel 

 and awl has led to various experimentation 

 with machine tools in the hope of devising 

 some more rapid method. The dental engine 

 and the electric mallet have been in use in 

 some laboratories for a number of years, and 

 have proved very efficient in such work as the 

 removal of hard matrix from small skulls. 

 However, their efficiency has so far been 

 limited to light work. This is probably due 

 in a large part to the fact that the tools used 

 are those constructed for the lighter work of 

 dentistry. It is also generally conceded that 

 electric appliances have not proved a success 

 in percussion tools. 



Pneumatic tools were introduced into the 

 paleontological laboratory at the Field Co- 

 lumbian Museum by the writer some four 

 months ago, and may now be said to have 

 passed through the experimental stage. The 

 application of these tools to fossil-cleaning 

 has proved so successful that it has seemed 

 worth while to call attention to their use in 

 this work. 



The pneumatic hammer as used in chipping 

 and riveting metals and in stone-cutting is too 

 well known to require description here. How- 

 ever, only the lightest hammers used in stone- 

 cutting come within range of our present con- 

 sideration. These are manufactured by a 

 number of firms in the United States and are 

 of two types, the pistol-grip and the straight 

 cylinder. The latter type has been adopted 

 by the writer on account of greater conven- 

 ience in bringing the tool into use in work in 

 all positions. Experimentation has shown 

 that the smallest hammers on the market as 

 stone working tools are heavy enough for any 

 work on fossils. A still smaller size would 

 often be convenient. 



The hammer in use consists of a cylindrical 

 chamber in which a five-eighth-inch steel 

 plunger having a five-eighth-inch stroke is 

 caused to play upon the head of the chisel at 

 the rate of 3,000 to 3,500 strokes per minute. 



