JAXIARY 18, 1895.] 



SCIENCE. 



i-3 



migrations ami occuiiaiu-y ; they preservo 

 extinct tongues or obsok'te forms ; and they 

 indicate the stage of culture of the people 

 who bestowed them. Especially useful in 

 these directions are the aboriginal names 

 on the American continent ; for the shifting 

 of the native population was so rapid, and 

 the dialects disappeared so quickly, that the 

 place-names are sometimes the only hints 

 left us of the presence of tribes iu given 

 localities. 



A model study in this field is that of Dr. 

 Karl Sapper in Globus, Bd. LXVI., No. G, 

 on ' The Native Place-names of Northern 

 Central America.' It embraces Guatemala, 

 Chiapas, Tabasco, and portions of Yucatan, 

 Honduras and San Salvador. The aim of 

 the writer is to define the limits of the 

 Mayan dialects, and to explain the presence 

 of Nahuatl influence. lie accomplishes his 

 purpose in a thorough manner. Mr. De 

 Peralta, in his Etiioluyia Centro- Americana 

 (Madrid, 1893), did much the same for 

 Costa Rica ; and in the Algonkian regions 

 of the Eastern United States, Mr. William 

 "Wallace Tooker ( in the American Anthropol- 

 ogist and other periodicals) has supplied 

 unquestionably correct analyses of the com- 

 plicated and often corrupt forms derived 

 from that stock. 



SOME KKCKXT EVKOPEAX ARTICLES ON 

 AMERICAN ARCHEOLOGY. 



Althouch some lolty archa'ologists in the 

 I'nited States display an inability to per- 

 ceive the value of the antiquities of this 

 continent, it is gratifying to note that this 

 purblindness does not prevail in Eurojje. 



What native .American skill could accom- 

 plish in the line of true art is well shown by 

 the reproduction on the design on a beau- 

 tifully colored and decorated vase from 

 Chama. (luatemala, figured by Herr Diesel- 

 I'orlf in the Zeitsch riff far Elhnologie, 1.S94, Heft 

 V. It will creditably bear comparison with 

 tlie iiigher periods of Etru.scan techni(jiie. 



In a publicatii)ii which has been lately 

 started by the Museum of Ethnogra])hy of 

 Berlin, called Ethiiulogii<ches Kotizblatt, Dr. E. 

 Seler, well known for his profound re- 

 searches into Mexican antiquity, has a copi- 

 ously illnstrated article on the great stone 

 sculi)tures of the Nati(mal Museum of Mex- 

 ico. He identifies several of the figures 

 about which doubt has been entertained. 



The Count de Charencey, also an author 

 who has written abundantly on American 

 subjects, has an article in the Hevue ck'n lie- 

 llgions for June last, on Leg Deformations 

 Vranienncs. Unfortunately, he lias not out- 

 gi'own the theories of Angrand and other 

 obsolete writers, who saw ' Toltecs ' and 

 ' Asiatic influence ' and the ' Ten Lost 

 Tribes ' wherever they turned their gaze in 

 the New ^^'orld. It is a pity that his real 

 learning should be thus misdirected. 



The Report, the ninth, of the British As- 

 sociation on the Xortlnvestern Tribes of Can-, 

 ada, contains this year but 11 pages, writ- 

 ten bj' Dr. Boas. At the next meeting it 

 will conclude its labors. 



SOME OF ADOLPU BASTIAN's LATER WRITINGS. 



The untiring activity of Professor Adolph 

 Bastian, wlio for more than a quarter of a 

 century has occupied the position of Direc- 

 tor of the Royal ^Iiiseum of Ethnography 

 at Berlin, is something amazing. 



He but recently returned from a long 

 journey iu the Orient, one of the products 

 of which was a remarkable book with a 

 not less remarkable title, Ideal Worlds ac- 

 cording to Vranographic Provinces, in which 

 he discusses at length the cosmogonies and 

 tiieog(mies of the i)liilosophers of India. 

 This indicates the special direction of his 

 studies of late years. They have turned 

 toward the elementary conceptions of primi- 

 tive and early pe((i>les concerning the uni- 

 verse, cosmogony and theogony, the nature 

 and destiny of the soul, the life and sup- 

 posed worlds hereafter, tlie processes of 



