Abstracts of Congress Papers 



43' 



300,000 miles of wire. It reached Greenwich, 

 England, in 1.33 seconds; the City of Mexico 

 in o. 11; Lick Observatory, California, in 0.05; 

 Sydney, Australia, in 3. 50, and Wellington, New 

 Zealand, in 4.00. The United States adopted 

 standard time on November 18, 1S83, and thus 

 did away forever with the confusion incident to 

 the use of local mean time. The hour meridians 

 used are 75 °, 90 , 105 , and 120 west from 

 Greenwich, designated respectively as eastern, 

 central, mountain, and Pacific standard time. 

 The same system has been adopted in our insu- 

 lar possessions and Alaska It is in use also in 

 practically all of Europe except France, Rus- 

 sia, and Ireland; in Egypt, South Africa, Can- 

 ada, Australia, and New Zealand, and in Japan 

 and Korea. France, including Tunis and Al- 

 giers, uses standard time of the meridian of 

 Paris ; Greece, that of Athens; Argentina, of 

 Cordoba; Ecuador, of Quito; Cuba, of Havana, 

 and Ireland, of Dublin In India, Madras time 

 is used very generally by the railroads and tele- 

 graphs, but it is usually converted into local 

 mean time for local use. The simplicity and 

 convenience of having the same common stand- 

 ard everywhere are so great in all international 

 relations, the conversion of one time into an- 

 other thus involving hours only, the minutes 

 and seconds being always the same, that it is 

 hoped soon to have the Greenwich system 

 adopted universally. 



which annihilated St. Pierre. The numerous 

 deformed objects of porcelain, glass, etc., which, 

 as recovered from Pompeii, were thought to 

 represent long periods of time effecting their 

 deformation, have again their exact counter- 

 part in objects recovered from St. Pierre, where 

 the deformation was accomplished in minutes 

 or seconds. 



THE DESTRUCTION OF POMPEII AS 



INTERPRETED BY THE VOLCANIC 



ERUPTIONS OF MARTINIQUE 



BY ANGELO HEILPRIN 



The eruptions of Pelee throw new light upon 

 the first recorded eruption of Vesuvius, and 

 render intelligible those passages in the Pliny 

 narration which have heretofore been obscure 

 and thought to be opposed by the facts of 

 geology. The "horrible black cloud," scin- 

 tillating with serpent-flashes of lightning, 

 which is described as rolling dozen the moun- 

 tain slope and blotting out the landscape, is 

 seemingly the absolute counterpart of the great 

 descending black cloud, similarly charged 

 with electricity, which was the distinctive 

 feature of the Pelee eruption of May S, 1902. 

 It was manifestly with the issuance of this 

 cloud that Pompeii was destroyed, which was, 

 therefore, on August 25 (not 2 ith, as generally 

 stated by historians 1, A I). 79, as Pliny's nar- 

 ration makes clear that this climax of activity 

 was reached on the second day of the eruption 

 of Vesuvius. The speaker expressed his con- 

 viction that Pompeii was not destroyed as the 

 result of simple incineration, as is generally 

 assumed by geologists and others, but in a man- 

 ner in all probability closely similar to that 



GAME AND FUR -BEARING ANIMALS 



AND THEIR INFLUENCE ON THE 



INDIAN OF THE NORTHWEST 



BY TOWNSEND W. THORNDIKE, M. D. 



Southward of Hudson Bay and the Canadian 

 barren-lands there lies a vast tract of swampy 

 territory, known as the "Muskeg region." 

 The industrial and commercial outlook for this 

 great stretch of watery lowlands is not encour- 

 aging. Ventures in mining, lumbering, and 

 agriculture, even if possible, are most remote. 

 Under these conditions to what profitable pur- 

 pose may this apparently worthless area be 

 put? Nature has shown us. She has made it 

 a most remarkable breeding ground and abode 

 for many of the valuable game and fur-bearing 

 animals. 



Thus guided by nature it is obvious that the 

 duty of the government should be to set aside 

 this Muskeg territory and establish preserves 

 for the propagation of these animals. In this 

 way an economic future of the land will be 

 assured by the resulting development of a per- 

 manent fur trade. 



Such preserves, besides affording protection 

 to the animals, will give to the Indian inhab- 

 itants of the region advantages of the greatest 

 possible benefit in relation to their social and 

 industrial status. 



This influence of animal life on the red man 

 has curiously enough been only slightly 

 touched upon by writers, and this is the more 

 astonishing when we reflect upon the role that 

 the wild animal has played in the develop- 

 ment of the Indian. Broadly speaking, it can 

 be said that the beasts of the forests and fields 

 are the foundations upon which rest the man- 

 ners, customs, and characteristics of the North 

 American Indian. 



The fact that this influence has never been 

 appreciated is, I believe, one of the chief rea- 

 sons for failures in our Indian policy. 



In the United States it is too late to make a 

 change in the conduct of our Indian affairs. 

 In northern Canada the situation is better, and 

 government action would be rewarded by an 

 increased producing power of a territory rap- 

 idly becoming valueless ; by the regeneration 

 of a fine type of Indians carrying on their 

 natural occupation of hunting, and independ- 

 ent of state aid, and by the disappearance of 

 the fear of extinction of animal life. 



