May 12. 1893.] 



SCIENCE. 



261 



by 34 feet high. The lenses alone would cost £8,400, an expen- 

 diture which would only be justified by the necessity for an ex- 

 ceptionally powerful light. 



Mr. D. A. Stevenson. Engineer to the Northern Lighthouse 

 Board, in a report on electric light as an illuminant, claims that 

 the complaints against the penetration of this light in fogs are 

 not well founded, and that many criticisms of its power are due 

 to prejudice, partly owing to the persistent way in which it is 

 decried as a lighthouse illuminant by certain writers to the press, 

 partly from a misunderstanding of the fact that, being very rich 

 in the most refrangible rays of the spectrum, that is, very white, 

 it suffers a greater percentage of diminution in passing through 

 fog than oil or gas light, which is redder, but nevertheless, owing 

 to its enormously greater initial power, the electric light is 

 always a better penetrator of fog than the others. He claims 

 that sailors, on their ordinary courses, are never in a position to 

 form an opinion of the subject that is worth anything, because 

 they cannot see different lights in the same conditions of atmos- 

 phere. He adduces observations made by keepers in his service 

 on each other's lights, which go to prove that the electric light is 

 in all cases the more powerful. These are observations from one 

 station burning an oil light to another electrically lighted, and 

 the reverse Three pairs of such stations are instanced; in every 

 case the electric light being visible in fog that totally obscured 

 the oil lamp. 



THE COLLECTION OF FOSSIL MAMMALS IN THE AMERI- 

 CAN MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY, NEW YORK. 



BY HENRY F. OSBORN, COLUMBIA COLLEGE, NEW YORK CITY. 



The third expedition from the Museum is now in the field, and 

 the collections of fossil mammals made under the direction of 

 Dr. J. L. Wottman during the summers of 1891 and 1892, are 

 being rapidly prepared for exhibition upon the geological floor 

 of the museum. The first year's work was in the Wahsatch 

 beds of the Big Horn Mountains, a country which had been very 

 thoroughly explored for Professor Cope. This yielded rather 

 disappointing results, although exceptionally fine material of 

 Coryphodon was procured, including very considerable portions 

 of the skeleton, which will soon be mounted for exhibition in the 

 museum. The most unique discovery in this horizon was the 

 skull of Paloeonictis, an ancient carnivore which has hitherto 

 been represented only by two lower jaws found in the Suessonian 

 of France, the horizon contemporary with the Wahsatch. 



Early in 1893 Dr. Wortman, accompanied by Mr. Peterson, who 

 had been for several years on the U. S. Geological Survey, 

 started into the Puerco or basal Eocene beds of northern New 

 Mexico, and by the most energetic and careful search in fields 

 which had also been explored for Professor Cope, succeeded in 

 procuring a very valuable collection of these Lower Eocene types. 

 Among the most unique specimens of this series are the upper 

 and lower jaws of Polyviastodon, a large-sized successor of the 

 ancient Plagiaulax of the Middle Jurassic beds. Another dis- 

 covery was the skull of Pantolambda, an ancestor of Coryphodon. 

 Altogether nearly five hundred specimens were shipped East 

 from this tour. The party then went into the Laramie, in search 

 of the Triceratops, but were unsuccessful. They secured later 

 in this horizon a large collection of the minute teeth of the Cre- 

 taceous mammals, which is paralleled only by that in the U. S. 

 Geological Survey collection. 



The richest results obtained thus far, however, are from the 

 White River Miocene of South Dakota. Here the beds are 800 feet 

 thick, and a thorough exploration was made from the bottom 

 series in which the huge Titanotherium is found, to the top in 

 which the new forms Protoceras, Artionyx and Aceratherium 

 tridactylum were found. These top beds were practically a 

 discovery, for nothing has been recorded from this stratum be- 

 fore, excepting the skull of a female Protoceras, which is in 

 the U. S. Geological Survey collection. The male Protoceras 

 presents four pairs of protuberances upon the skull, the most ex- 

 ceptional being the large vertical plates upon the maxillaries. 

 Tin? \Vhite River Miocene is the classic ground of Leidy's me- 

 moirs, b u in these and by far the greater part of the literature 



of this horizon, the animals only of the so-called "Oreodon" 

 stratum have been described, together with the forms from 

 the lower '• Titanotherium " stratum. This has been due to the 

 fact that these strata at once attract the ordinary collector by 

 the profusion of bones which are washed out from them. An 

 intervening stratum between the "Oreodon" and "Titano- 

 therium " layer, appears, also, to have been generally overlooked, 

 because of its unpromising exterior. Mr. S. Garman, collecting 

 for the Museum of Comparative Zoology, some years ago secured 

 one specimen of the very unique Rhinoceros-like form, Metamy- 

 nodon, the type specimen and the only one which has hitherto 

 been known. Dr. Wortman directed his attention, therefore, es- 

 pecially to the location of this stratum, and succeeded in finding 

 a seam about thirty feet in thickness, which proves to be espe- 

 cially characterized by abundant remains of Metamynodon. The 

 party secured four or five skulls, and one nearly complete skele- 

 ton. This animal is distinguished by huge canine tusks in the 

 anterior portion of the head, which give it an appearance quite 

 different from that of the rhinoceros; in fact, the skull and 

 skeleton are entirely peculiar, and unlike any perissodactyl which 

 has been found hitherto. Yet this animal flourished in the 

 midst of large herds of true rhinoceroses, for the diligent search 

 made by the museum party has resulted in the discovery of a 

 whole series of hornless rhinoceroses, from the bottom of these 

 beds to the top. They increase gradually in size, and in the 

 evolution of the teeth, in the loss of the lateral fifth toe in the 

 fore foot, and reach a culminating point in the new species, 

 Aceratherium tridactylum. As the name indicates, this species 

 is mainly characterized by the presence of but three toes in the 

 fore foot. It is represented in the museum collection by one of 

 the most remarkable specimens which has ever been found. This 

 is a complete skeleton from the tip of the nose to the tip of the 

 tail, lacking only the fore limb of the left side, and a few of the 

 ribs and sternal bones. It is over seven feet long and four feet 

 high, and has been mounted upon a large panel of sandstone and 

 plaster, giving the impression that it has been simply hewn out 

 of "the matrix. The animal appears to be of about the same size 

 and proportions as Ceratorhinus or the rhinoceros of Sumatra ; in 

 fact it has very nearly the same proportions and form, except 

 that it lacks the small horns upon the nasals and frontals 

 Among American species its affinities are with the Aphelops 

 megalodus Cope of the top of the Miocene. 



A third specimen of note is the hind foot of Artionyx. As 

 Leidy called Oreodon a ruminating hog. so this animal might be 

 called a clawed hog, for the foot closely resembles that of the 

 pig or peccary, until we reach the phalanges, which have articu- 

 lations and large terminal claws somewhat similar to those seen 

 in the bears, while the ankle-joint is of the artiodactyl type, and 

 the four toes are set in pairs on either side of the median line, 

 there being also the rudiment of a fifth The name given this 

 fossil refers to its combination of the artiodactyl and unguiculate 

 character. This is possibly a relative of the clawed Ungulate — 

 Chalicotherium. — which presents such a remarkable combination 

 of characters, and is now known to have been distributed over 

 North America, Europe, and Asia, during Miocene times. The 

 contrast between these two types is very striking; for while 

 Artionyx combines an artiodactyl foot with uncleft claws, Chali- 

 cotherium combines a perissodactyl foot with cleft claws. One 

 of the most interesting problems of the future will be clearing up 

 the relations between these two forms and their relations to other 

 groups. 



CURRENT NOTES ON ANTHROPOLOGY.— XXVII. 



[Edited by D. G. Brinton, M.D., LL.D.'i 



Theories in Criminal Anthropology. . 



Two articles which appeared almost simultaneously in February 



last present with sharpness and brevity the conflicting views of 



the two leading schools of criminal anthropology. 



One is by Dr. Sorel, in the Revue Scientifiqne. It is a warm 

 defence of the doctrines so strenuously urged by Professor Lorn- 

 broso, and which were substantially repudiated at the Congress 

 of Brussels last year (see Science, Nov. 18). Sorel maintains 



