442 



SCIENCE. 



LVOL. IX., No. 222 



political. The Poro is a very powerful institu- 

 tion, which exerts a great influence over the 

 destiny of those countries, and in reality super- 

 sedes the power of the chiefs. The Poro arranges 

 the affairs of the tribes, settles disputes, and makes 

 laws. Even intertribal wars are sometimes 

 stopped by its arbitration. Its representatives or 

 messengers are always held sacred, and nobody 

 dares to disobey its commands. All travellers 

 who have entered the interior of this part of 



Besides these specimens, unworked pieces of ne- 

 phrite were found in Alaska by Capt. A. Jacobson, 

 who affirms that the Eskimos find it in situ. This 

 proves that the material is found in several parts 

 of north-western America. According to Daw- 

 son, the implements occur as far inland as the 

 Caribu and Gold mountains, while farther inland 

 they are rarer. The late Prof. H. Fischer and 

 other scientists were of the opinion that jade and 

 nephrite came exclusively from Asia, and consid- 



PlG. 1. 



Fig. 2. 



Fig. 3 



Africa tell of the predominant influence this insti- 

 tution exerts in the states of the Mandingos and 

 their neighbors. 



Dr. George M. Dawson contributes an impor- 

 tant paper on the much-discussed jade question 

 {Can. record of science, April, 1887). He describes 

 two partially worked bowlders of jade which were 

 found at Yale and Lytton in British Columbia. 

 The occurrence of these pieces makes it evident 

 that the material was worked at that place by 

 cutting the hard stone by means of a thong or a 

 thin piece of wood in conjunction with sharp sand. 



ered its occurrence in Europe and America as a 

 proof of early migrations. In a paper published 

 after his death {Archiv fur Anthropologie, 1886, 

 p. 563), Fischer gives a very complete list of 

 nephrite, jade, and chloromelanite objects found 

 in Europe, which is illustrated by a map of Europe 

 showing their distribution. The principal features 

 of the map are the absence of nephrite in France 

 and Germany, while jade and chloromelanite 

 implements are scattered all over the country. 

 Speaking in a general way, the Elbe forms the 

 eastern limit of the distribution of these imple- 

 ments. Nephrite is almost exclusively found on 



