146 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. VIII., No. 184 



Furthermore, on the left bank below Miles's glacier, 

 and opposite Child's, is an enormous glacial _ drift 

 now covered with vegetation. Where this is jomed 

 to Miles's it is impossible to distinguish the drift from 

 the glacier. 



The flow of these is now from east to west tor 

 those on the left bank, and from west to east for 

 those on the right bank ; yet this is not the general 

 course the masses had v/hen much larger than at 

 present. They are at present but a residuum of the 

 once extensive ice fields now discharging along the 

 paths of least resistance. Had not the climate here 

 been moist and in other respects favorable for glacier 

 making, the present site would h^ve been occupied 

 by only drift or moraine. Farther north, above the 

 Chittyna on the east bank of the Copper, are for 

 many miles terraces large and small. The smaller 

 ones are so regularly formed as to leave the impres- 

 sion that they were the fi'onts of old fortifications. 



In Blake's ' Stickeen Eiver,' he makes mention of 

 the scarcity of well-defined terraces, while Dall also 

 failed to observe any in the vicinity of Sitka and the 

 Alaska Peninsulas. 



I can only account for the remarkable width of the 

 bed of the Copper by the supposition that it was ex- 

 cavated by the power of gigantic ice masses assisted 

 by the eroding effects of the torrent waters from 

 them. The volume of water in proportion to the 

 width of bed is less than in any river within my 

 knowledge, vet the banks, as a rule, are high and 

 rather steep. The sources of the Copper and its prin- 

 cipal tributary, the Chittyn4, are glaciers, though 

 small in comparison with those above mentioned. 



By an examination of the map it will be seen that 

 the Alaskan Mountains form an arc convex to the 

 northward ; hence the lines of least resistance of ice 

 masses in moving from these mountains to the south- 

 ward, tended to intersect in the present Copper val 

 ley. The result was the enormous power producing 

 the remarkable excavations cited above. 



I earnestly hope that glacial action in this district 

 will receive early attention at the hands of compe- 

 tent men. A simple inspection of the maps of Alas- 

 ka, however deficient in detail they are, by a student 

 of nature will show that this locality was the scene 

 of most powerful action, the traces of which are cor- 

 respondingly clearly preserved. 



North of the Alaskan Mountains I failed to observe 

 any of these remarkable glacial phenomena, though 

 from reports of miners they may be found in the 

 White Eiver region. 



Henry T. Allen. 

 Fort Walla Walla, Washington Tev., Aug. 1. 



The significance of coincident weather«condi- 

 tions. 



In your criticism (Aug. 6) upon my article entitled, 

 ' The significance of coincident weather-conditions,' 

 you intimate that I have not given proper heed to 

 'dissimilar weather.' It did not seem to me necessary 

 to dwell at length upon that phase of the subject in 

 order to make my meaning plain. But inasmuch as 

 there seems to be an entire misunderstanding, I will 

 now say that any theory that demands, for instance, 

 that a typhoon shall occur in New York state is mani- 

 festly absurd. The influence of oceans, and conti- 

 nents, and of mountain ranges, and the like, must be 

 taken into the account. In certain latitudes storms 

 have a well-defined character at certain seasons of 



the year. Thus, dissimilarity of weather conditions 

 in different localities is readily accounted for. There 

 are times, however, when great storms occur almost 

 simultaneously in every quarter of the globe. _ My 

 point is that such an event affords an opportunity to 

 test the theory that there is a direct relation of some 

 sort between disturbances on the sun and storms on 

 the earth. If this relation does exist, the sun should be 

 disturbed in proportion to the magnitude of these ex- 

 ceptional atmospheric movements on the earth. That 

 this was the case during the storm.s in May, the rec- 

 ords of the condition of the sun then made will show 

 (see Nature for July 22, p. 278). Also consult any 

 records accessible in regard to the terrestrial and 

 solar conditions existing on March 31, 1886. It would 

 manifestly be unsafe to generalize on the basis of one 

 or two such cases. But when numerous instances of 

 this sort have been recorded, it would seeni quite 

 proper to call attention to the matter, as constituting 

 one" item of information in regard to a great and 

 complex subject about which confessedly but little is 

 known. In the words of my article, " the truth of 

 the theory that the condition of the sun modifies the 

 weather on the earth can be tested by considering 

 the case of great storms that prevail widely." 



M. A. Veeder. 

 Lyons, N. Y., Aug. 7. 



Poisoning by ice-cream. 



No chemist certainly would suppose that the same 

 poison exists in all samples of ice-cream which have 

 produced untoward symptoms in man. Mineral poi- 

 sons, copper, lead, arsenic, and mercury, have all 

 been found in ice cream. In some instances these 

 have been used with criminal intent. In other cases 

 their presence has been aceidental. Likewise, that 

 vanilla is sometimes the bearer, at least, of the poi- 

 son, is well known to all chemists. Dr. Bartley's 

 idea that the poisonous properties of the cream which 

 he examined were due to putrid gelatine is certainly 

 a rational theory. The poisonous principle might in 

 this case arise from the decomposition of the gelatine ; 

 or with the gelatine there may be introduced into the 

 milk a ferment, by the growth of which a poison is 

 produced. 



But in the cream which I examined, none of the 

 above sources of the poisoning existed. There were 

 no mineral poisons present. No gelatine of any kind 

 had been used in making the cream. The vanilla 

 used was shown to be not poisonous. This showing 

 was made, not by a chemical analysis, which might 

 not have been conclusive, but Mr. Novie and I drank 

 of the vanilla extract which was used, and no ill re- 

 sults followed. Still, from this cream we isolated 

 the same poison which I had before found in poison- 

 ous cheese (Zeitschrift fur j^Jiysiologische chemie, x, 

 heft 2), and demonstrated its poisonous properties by 

 experiments upon cats. Moreover, by adding a piece 

 of the solid portion of the poisonous cream, about the 

 size of a filbert, to some normal milk, and making 

 cream with this milk, following the details of the 

 maker of the Lawton cream, omitting, however, all 

 flavoring, I obtained a highly poisonous cream. 

 Does this not prove that the poison may be produced 

 by fermentation in good milk ? A detailed account 

 of my experiments may be found in mjr report to the 

 Michigan state board of health. 



V. C. Vaughan. 

 Ann Arbor, August 9. 



