O SANTA BARBARA SOCIETY OF NATURAL HISTORY. 



does no harm^whatever, neither causing cold nor cough, nor 

 increasing them if they already exist." In Flint's Physiology 

 it is stated that "the consumption of oxygen bears a pretty 

 constant ratio to the production of carbonic acid, and that the 

 exhalation of carbonic acid is much greater in a moist than in 

 a dry atmosphere, and much greater at low than at high tem- 

 peratures, within the limits of heat and cold that are easily 

 borne by the human subject." Dr. Max Van Pettenkofer 

 asserts that "in our dry climate is laid the foundation of the 

 nervousness which characterizes our people." Dr. Edward 

 Young says that "the dry air with us produces nervous, 

 energetic, large-jointed skeletons, which have little or nothing 

 in common with the stout, fresh, rosy, phlegmatic inhabitants 

 of the mother country." 



So far the evidence seems to prove that extremes in 

 humidity and dryness are to be avoided, as are extremes in 

 temperature. 



INFUSORIAL EARTH AT SANTA BARBARA, CALIFORNIA. 

 BY WILLIAM W. FINCH, M. D. 



North of Santa Barbara, and rising from the northern 

 boundary of the city, is a deposit of infusorial earth; made 

 up mainly of the silicious shells of Diatoms; and most of the 

 mass, so free from other matter as to merit the title of 

 Diatomacious earth. 



I am indebted to the San Francisco Microscopical Society 

 for what knowledge I possess of the microscopic organisms 

 making up the bed. In portions of the bed, a great variety of 

 fossil organisms are found. Silicified cetacial vertebra are 

 quite common, that must have belonged to some animal 

 fifteen or twenty feet in length — probably a species of Beluga, 

 like the Beluga Leucas, or small northern white whale. 

 Small fishes, two or three inches in length, are often found; 

 some with only the spinal column entire; others with the fins 

 and head entire, and others with viscera in place, and the 



