November 2, 1888. J 



SCIENCE. 



211 



1888, said that he believed them to be of Aztec origin. They are 

 sun and fire worshippers, and believe in the transmigration of souls, 

 and that their departed friends sometimes enter into coyotes, and 

 thus linger about their former habitation. They practise crema- 

 tion. Their principal article of food is the mesquite-bean, which 

 they triturate in mortars of wood or stone, after which the meal is 

 sifted ; and the coarser portion is used as food for their liorses and 

 cattle, and the finer is made into cakes for family use. I3r. Lind- 

 ley found, on a visit here, asthmatics, rheumatics, and consump- 

 tives, all of whom reported wonderful recoveries. Some of these 

 stories he accepted cum grano sails, which quotation is, by the way, 

 especially applicable to the salt-fields. These asthmatics and con- 

 sumptives claim that the farther they get below sea-level, and the 

 dryer the atmosphere, the easier they breathe. The rheumatics 

 claim that the heat and dryness improves the circulation, and thus 

 relieves them. Dr. Lindley did not stay long enough to make any 

 trustworthy observations; but he thought, that, aside from dryness 

 — mean annual relative humidity certainly not over twenty-five — 

 and equability, there was considerable atmospheric pressure at a 

 point three hundred and fifty feet below sea-level, and that there 

 was here moderately compressed air on a large scale. In a recent 

 paper on the use of the pneumatic cabinet, the author, from many 

 cases in practice, showed that compressed air relieves asthmatics 

 and cases of phthisis. He says the compressed air will_ gradually 

 force its way into every part of the lung, in order that the pressure 

 may be the same on the inside as on the out. While the proportion 

 of oxygen is, of course, not increased, yet there is an increased 

 quantity in a given space, and we really have the oxygen treatment 

 here on an extensive scale. 



In connection with his paper. Dr. Lindley adds an interesting 

 note in which he gives the following list of other places below sea- 

 level : " Sink of the Amorgosa (Arroyo del Muerto), in eastern Cali- 

 fornia, two hundred and twenty-five feet below sea-level ; the 

 Caspian Sea, eighty-five feet below sea-level. Lake Assal, east of 

 Abyssinia in the Afar country, eight miles long and four miles 

 wide, is about seven hundred and sixty feet below sea-level. Its 

 shores are covered with a crust of salt about a foot thick. This 

 salt is a source of revenue to the Afars, as they carry it by caravans 

 to Abyssinia, where they find a ready market. There are several 

 ■other depressions about six hundred feet below sea-level in this 

 vicinity. The noted oasis Siwah, in the Libyan desert, three hun- 

 dred miles west of Cairo, is one hundred and twenty feet below 

 •sea-level. Here are beautiful date-palm groves, and here also the 

 apricot, the olive, the pomegranate, and the vine are extensively 

 cultivated. In this same desert is the oasis Araj, two hundred and 

 sixty-six feet below sea-level. There are also numerous other de- 

 pressions in the desert portion of Algeria and at various points on 

 the Sahara Desert." 



Garbage-Cremation. 



Our readers who are interested in garbage-cremation will find an 

 ■excellent paper on this subject in the Journal of the American 

 Medical Association, Oct. 13. 1 888. The author of the paper is 

 Dr. J. Berrien Lindsley of Nashville, Tenn. Dr. Lindsley is the 

 treasurer of the American Public Health Association, and has made 

 the cremation of garbage a special study. The difficulties con- 

 nected with the disposition of a city's refuse may be imagined 

 from the following statistics which he gives : — 



ISaltimore, August, 1887. estimated by police census, had a popu- 

 lation of 437,155. The amount of night-soil delivered at the dumps 

 for the year ending Dec. 3t, 1887. was 51,107 loads, or 10,221,400 

 gallons. Probably more than half the inhabitants use water-closets, 

 which carry off an equal amount. The dead animals, etc., removed 

 during the same year were : 



Total number of (lend anim.ils 35,249 



'* " " " fowls 9i074 



" fish 33.574 



*' " *■ cartloads of dead fish, vegetable 

 and other offal removed from vari- 

 ous docks 1.067 



■* " " poundsof decayed meat condemned 1,495 



■* '* " dozens of eggs condemned 607 



Richmond, population loo.ooo. The report of conlracior for re- 

 moval of garbage, or kitchen refuse, year 1887, shows total number 

 of loads carried off. 2,680 = 72,200 bushels. 



Memphis, population 62,335. Number of loads of garbage re- 

 moved in 1887 was 29,120. 



In this country the experiment of destroying garbage by means 

 of a furnace constructed especially for that purpose was first tried 

 on Governor's Island, New York harbor. A description of this 

 garbage-cremator was given in the Sanitary Engineer o{ Aug. 13, 

 1885, by Lieutenant Reilly, at that lime acting assistant-(|uarter- 

 master. United States Army. 



In the twelfth volume of ' Public Health,' containing the reports 

 and papers presented to the American Public Health Association, 

 at the Toronto meeting, October, 1886, may be found a paper by 

 Dr. George liaird of Wheeling, giving an account not only of the 

 destruction of garbage, but also of night-soil, by means of a furnace 

 contrived by M. V. Smith, M.E.. Bissell's Block, Pittsburgh, Penn. 

 In the ' Report on the Sanitary State of Montreal, for the Year 1886,' 

 will be found an interesting narrative in this connection, giving in- 

 structive details as to cost, showing the extent of the work to be 

 done, and the complete success of the refuse-crematories, and also 

 of the night-soil crematories constructed by Mr. William Mann. 

 Dr. Louis Laberge, health-officer of Montreal, read an elaborate 

 paper on this topic at the meeting of the American Public Health 

 .Association in Memphis, last November, which will be found in the 

 thirteenth volume of' Public Health,' now in press. The Sanitary 

 NcTi's of Nov. 1 9, 1 887, states that at Des Moines, lo., a small Engle 

 furnace is in experimental use, and is working very satisfactorily. 

 At Pittsburgh a Rider furnace has just commenced its service. In 

 Chicago a Mann furnace was being constructed. In the same jour- 

 nal, March 17, 1888, may be found a full description of the Chicago 

 garbage-crematory, from which a duplicate of the plant could be 

 built if desired. On April 14 it reports that the said crematory is 

 doing good service in disposing of about fifty tons of material a day. 

 The Satiltary A'ews of March 10, 1888, reports the success of the 

 disposal of garbage by cremation at Milwaukee. 



HE.A.LING OF Wounds.— Prof. Leon Le Fort believes that the 

 impurity of the air has no injurious effect upon wounds, and that 

 it may be ignored. He believes that wounds will successfully heal 

 if perfect cleanliness is maintained by the surgeon, as to his person, 

 and every thing used by him in his operation. 



Lead-Poisoning.— Dr. Herald of Newark, N. J., has, during the 

 past six months, had fifty cases of lead-poisoning in his practice, 

 which he has traced to soda-water contained in the five-cent patent- 

 stopper bottles. In some of the stoppers examined by him he 

 found 42.4 per cent of lead, and in others 83.6 per cent. The ac- 

 tion of the carbonic acid in the water upon the lead in the stopper 

 ultimately produces a bi-carbonate of lead, which, when absorbed 

 from the stomach, causes lead-poisoning. 



Potato-Poisoning. — A large numberof soldiers were recently 

 poisoned while on duty at one of the French fortifications. It is 

 believed that the solanine in unripe potatoes was the cause of the 

 sickness. 



ETHNOLOGY. 

 The Laws of Marriage and Descent. 

 At the recent meeting of the British Association, Dr. E. B. Tyler 

 read an interesting paper on the laws of marriage and descent, illus- 

 trative of his ingenious method of studying ethnological phenomena. 

 All myths and customs, on a close study, may by analysis be disin- 

 tegrated, and are found to consist of certain elements. Dr. Tylor 

 arranges these elements statistically, and, by inquiring which occur 

 simultaneously among various peoples, proves that certain groups 

 of such elements belong genetically together. This he calls the 

 method of adhesions. The results thus obtained are of the greatest 

 importance from a psychological as well as from an historical stand- 

 point. As a test of the results to be obtained by this means, he 

 examines the custom which forbids the husband and his wife's 

 parents, although they may be on a friendly footing, to speak or look 

 at one another, or mention one another's names. Some seventy 

 peoples practise this or the converse custom. On classifying the 

 marriage rules of mankind, Dr. Tylor found that the avoidance cus- 

 tom between the husband and the wife's family belongs preponder- 

 antly to the group of cases where the husband goes to live with 



