332 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. XXI. No. 541 



The material as received is in the form of (1) nodular, some- 

 what rounded masses, the largest perhaps the size of a^ooseegg; 

 (2) in elongated cylindrical forms sometimes incompletely perfor- 

 ated, longitudinally, and (3) as rounded grains forming one of the 

 constituents of a loosely coherent, silicious sand=!tone. The ma- 

 terial is of a grayish color on the outer surface, indicating oxida- 

 tion, but interiorly it has all the characteristics of genuine bees- 

 wax, both as regards physical conditions, color, smell, fusing 

 point, and conduct towards chemical reagents. 



In the letter accompanying, the wax is said to be found in 

 masses of all sizes up to 250 pounds weight; that it occurs imbed- 

 ded in the sand, being found while digging clams at low tide, 

 and at a depth of 20 feet below the surface when digging wells. 

 The material has been traced for a distance of 30 miles up the 

 river. 



Tradition has it that many hundred years ago a foreign vessel, 

 (some say a Chinese junk) laden with was, was wrecked off this 

 coast. This at first thought seems plausible, but aside from the 

 difficulty of accounting for the presence in these waters and at 

 that date, of a vessel loaded with wax, it seems scarcely credible 

 that the material could have been brought, in a single cargo, in 

 such quantities, nor buried so deejjly over so large an area. In a 

 fragment of the sandstone above alluded to, the wax occurs in 

 disseminated gi-ains less than half the size of a pin's head and in 

 such abundance that when ignited the stone falls away to a loose 

 gray silicious sand. My correspondent states that the material 

 has been mined by the whites for ever 20 years, but not to any 

 great extent excepting the last 8 or 10 years, during which time 

 many hundred tons have been shipped to San Francisco and Port- 

 land, and sold at the rate of 18 cents per pound. 



Concerning the accuracy of the account as above given the 

 present writer knows nothing. It is here given in the hope of 

 gaining more information on the subject. 



George P. Merrill. 



XT. S. National Museum, Washington, D.C., June 9. 



Books for Children. 



Will some specialists in natural history recommend some really 

 satisfactory cheap books suitable for the guidance of children, ten 

 years of age, in their rambles through the fields and svoods? Most 

 of the cheap books that I have seen do not give the necessary de- 

 tails for identifying specimens, and yet the naming of what is 

 seen or collected is necessary for arousing enthusiasm in studying 

 the forms of life. Some of the topics which I am inquiring about 

 are as follows : — 



The naming of free birds from their size, plumage, song, and 

 habits; and the place and manner of constructing nests and habits 

 of nesting. The naming of trees and shrubs from their bark and 

 leaves. The naming of weeds and flowers found growing wild in 

 the east-central part of the United States. The naming of land- 

 snails, beetles, butterflies, and moths, and their habits. 



Perhaps the Agassiz associations have made out lists of the 

 specimens to be found in the. various regions of the United States. 

 If this has been done, I have not happened to see any notice of it. 



In this connection, I wish to mention the work done by my own 

 teacher in a suburban school at Cincinnati more than twenty 

 years ago. The superintendent of the school, Mr. A. G. Weatherby, 

 afterwards a professor in the Cincinnati University, was an inde- 

 fatigable collector in various departments of natural history, and 

 his enthusiasm was communicated to his pupils so strongly that 

 there was hardly a boy in his school-room who had not a collec- 

 tion of local moths, land-snail shells, and fresh-water clam-shells. 

 We had them all properly prepared and Mr. Weatherby named 

 them for us; but we learned the localities in which different 

 species were to be found through the broad experience of our 

 teacher, and not from books. In fact, although many of our class 

 of boys had almost complete sets of local snail-shells, and all 

 named, yet I doubt if any of us ever looked into a work on con- 

 chology. I do not know whether any of Mr. Weatherby's early 

 pupils have since become professional naturalists, as a result of 

 his teachings, but I do know that the collecting excursions made 



under his direction were most beneficial as a means of sharpening 

 our powei-s of observation, and added immensely to the happiness 

 of boyhood. 



I am sure that many readers of Science will be glad to get infor- 

 mation such as I have asked for, as very few parents are able to 

 help their childi-en in classifying and naming the "finds" that 

 they are continually bringing in from the fields. 



Frank Waldo. 



Princeton, N.J., Jane 5. 



Worms in the Brain of a Bird. 



In your issue of June 2 is a communication "Relative to Worms 

 in the Brain of a Bird." 



Your correspondent will find, by consulting "Fresh- Water 

 Shell Mounds of the St. John's River, Florida," by Professor 

 Jeffries Wyman, page 7, foot-note, an account of a parasitical 

 worm commonly found in the brain of the "snake bird," or 

 water turkey. Clarence B. Moore. 



Philadelphia, June 6. 



Note on a Supposed New Endogenous Tree from the Carbon- 

 iferous. 



In the May number of the American Geologist (Vol. XL, 1893, 

 pp. 285, 286, PL VI.) I find a short paper by Mr. H. Herzer on 

 "A New Tree from the Carboniferous Rocks of Monroe County, 

 Ohio," in which he descriijes, under the name of WinchelUna 

 fasaina, anew genus and species. The discovery of a new genus 

 of plants in the Carboniferous, a formation of which the flora is 

 noiv so very well known, is of itself of considerable interest, bub 

 when we learn that it was an endogenous tree the interest deepens, 

 and the discovery, if true, would be the most important addition 

 to our knowledge of the ancestors of this great group of plants 

 that has been made in many years. 



The Carboniferous has been called the age of ferns, from the 

 great abundance and high state of development enjoyed by this 

 class of plants in this part of the Paleozoic system. Several sup- 

 posed endogens have been reported from the Paleozoic, but they 

 have sooner or later been shown to belong to other vegetable 

 classes, and at the present time there is not a single form accepted 

 by paleobotanists as belonging to this age. In fact it is not until 

 well up into the Mesozoic that undoubted endogens made their 

 appearance. This is, of course, negative evidence, but it is so 

 strong that it requires the most positive and convincing evidence 

 to prove their earlier ancestry. 



The literature relating to the internal structure of plants of the 

 Paleozoic is now very extensive, and from a careful study of this 

 it appears almost beyond question that the supposed new endo- 

 genous tree is a fem-stem of a well-known type. I have not 

 seen the original trunk or sections cut from it, but, judging from 

 the somewhat imperfect description and figures, it Is impossible 

 to see any differences of importance between WinchelUna fascina 

 a.nd Psaronius coite corda" from the Permian of Saxony. It 

 also approaches very closely to Tubiculites (Psaronius) relaxato- 

 maximus'' Grand'Eury, a fern-stem from the Carboniferous of 

 central France. The cell-bundles described by Mr. Herzer are 

 quite unlike those of any monocotyledon with which I am fa- 

 miliar, but agree well with those described for fern-stems from 

 the older rocks. The reference of this plant to the ferns is also 

 quite in accord with facts that have long been known, for Dr. 

 Newberry recorded the genus Psaronius as occurring " in great 

 abundance" in the Carboniferous rocks of Ohio more than forty 

 years ago.' 



The genus Psaronius is a somewhat comprehensive one, and a 

 number of more or less satisfactory genera have recently been 

 separated out of it by Williamson, Renault, Zeiller and others, 

 and it is possible that when the fossil under discussion is more 



■ Stenzal, Ueber die Staarstelne, Jena 1854, p. 867, PI. xxxv.. Fig. 1. 



» Flore CarbonifSre du Dept. de la Loire. Mem. I'Acad. d. Sci., xxlv., 1877, 

 p. 102, PI. X., Figs. 3, 4. 

 1 1 = Annals oi Science, No. 8, Feb. 1, 1853, p. 97. 



