January 5, 1900.] 



SCIENCE. 



31 



though never operated, owing to the develop- 

 ment of the corundum industry in Canada. 



Ex-Governor W. A. Richards, Assistant 

 Commissioner of the General Land Office, who 

 was present and was Invited to speak, said 

 that the Land Office was in earnest in this mat- 

 ter and was glad to have a truly scientific report 

 on the subject. He stated that a very large 

 amount of the material was now being worked 

 up in this country into articles to be sold at the 

 coming Paris Exposition. 



F. A. Lucas described ' Blue Fox Trapping 

 on the Pribilofs,' saying, that Mr. James Judge, 

 Treasury agent on St. George Island, had ex- 

 perimented extensively in the feeding and 

 trapping of foxes, and had devised methods by 

 which they could be readily taken alive, so 

 that the females could be liberated, as well as a 

 certain proportion of the males, the other males 

 being killed. The entire paper will appear in 

 Science. 



M. B. Waite described a ' Soil Inoculation 

 Experiment with Soy Beans,' in testing the ef- 

 fect of imported Japanese soil on the Soy bean. 

 This plant is a native of Japan and in that 

 country forms root tubercles abundantly. In 

 this country the plants commonly do not form 

 root tubercles, for the reason that the neces- 

 sary germs do not exist in American soils. 

 The Soy beau is thus unable to gather free 

 nitrogen after the manner of other Legumi- 

 nosae. 



Soil was imported from a Soy bean field in 

 Japan and sown in small quantities in the drill 

 with the seed. The experiment was tried on a 

 newly cleared piece of sandy land poor in com- 

 bined nitrogen, and the results were quite strik- 

 ing. The plants in the control rows at harvest 

 time plainly showed nitrogen starvation. In 

 the rows inoculated with Japanese soil the 

 plants were larger, leafier and darker green in 

 color. They showed the effects of nitrogen 

 fertilization. On examining the roots they were 

 found to be well supplied with the nitrogen, 

 gathering tubercles,[v,'hile the check plants had 

 few or none. The comparative weight of the 

 treated and untreated portions was as 14 to 8 

 in favor of the treated plants. 



O. F. Cook, 

 Secretary. 



ONONDAGA ACADEMY OF SCIENCE. 



The November meeting of the Academy was 

 addressed by Dr. J. M. Clarke, the New York 

 State paleontologist. He gave briefly a his- 

 tory of the work accomplished by the geo- 

 logical survey of the State from its inception in 

 1842 to the present time, and explained in de- 

 tail the new system of nomenclature proposed 

 for the State, giving reasons for accepting the 

 same. The latter part of the address was de- 

 voted to an account of the transitional fauna of 

 the Portage and Chemung formations. 



At the meeting of the Geological Section Mr. 

 C. E. Wheelock read a paper on ' The Blarls of 

 Onondaga County.' He showed that the prin- 

 cipal deposit crossed the county just north of its 

 center and in an east and west direction, corre- 

 sponding quite closely with the southern extent 

 of the extinct Lake Iroquois. The beds in the 

 western part of the county were studied in de- 

 tail, and would seem to bear out the theory 

 that there had occurred several oscillations of 

 the lake shore. Excavations within the limits 

 of Syracuse seem to corroborate the same 

 theory. Mr. Wheelock believed that this marl 

 deposit was cotemporaneous in formation with 

 the existence of Lake Iroquois. The few iso- 

 lated and small deposits in other parts of the 

 county he held to be of different and probably 

 more recent formation. 



At the December meeting Dr. W. M. Beau- 

 champ spoke on local archaeology. He said 

 that the village sites and their approximate 

 dates of occupation could be traced by the 

 relics found on the various sites. As the Onon- 

 dagas occupied usually only one village, their 

 migrations are more easily traced than tribes 

 consisting of several villages. The occurrence of 

 implements of walrus tusks, and also a peculiar 

 variety of stone knife, prove beyond reasonable 

 doubt that the Eskimos were earlier inhabitants, 

 even if only temporary, than the Indians. 



Dr. W. G. Hinsdale described the character 

 of relics found on local sites, speaking more par- 

 ticularly of the harpoons, barbed fish-hooks and 

 other polished bone implements. Grooved axes 

 are only rarely found in this section, and im- 

 plements are seldom found buried with the 

 skeletons unearthed. H. W. Bkitchee, 



Corresponding Secretary. 



