fecal 
240 General Notes. [ April, 
on a burdock, and when I stooped to catch it, it tore itself away, leaving 
a number of its feathers on the burs. A few days after, I caught a 
yellow-rumped warbler (Dendroica coronata) fastened to the same kind 
‘of plant. — A. K. FISHER. 
i ANTH OLOGY. 
ANTHROPOLOGICAL Nores.— Those who attempt to institute a com- 
parison respecting the elaboration of culture in the Old World and in 
the New, and to sum up the contributions of nature in the two hemi- 
spheres, must not forget that in the western men wrought only with 
their hands, that they had the service of not a single tractive animal, of 
no beast of burden excepting the llama, that they had no cows for milk, 
no domestic animals for slaughter; and but for the faithful wolf-dog, the 
aborigines of North America would have been absolutely cut off from 
the advantages of those friends of man which in the eastern hemisphere 
are indissolubly‘linked with progress. 
The railway companies of Western Germany having taken steps to 
secure and preserve all historical and prehistorical relics found in their 
gradings, some fich discoveries have been their reward. At Durkheim 
a highly ornamented Roman tripod inlaid with gold and other metals 
was found. Near Eisenberg, a Roman grave with rich deposits was 
opened. 7 
Prof. George Rolleston’s paper in the Journal of the Anthropological 
Institute (v. ii. 120), On the People of the Long Barrow Period, is a 
very interesting treatment of the subject. We can extract only a few 
sentences. As to the physical characteristics of the people, the male 
skeletons were very generally about 5.5 feet, the female 4.8 feet. The 
average difference between the statures of males and females in civilized 
races is about half this amount, while a precisely similar disproportion is 
observable at the present day in the stature of individuals of the two 
sexes among savages. In studying the skulls we are to take into ac- 
count what the author, quoting Professor Cleland, calls “ ill-filledness,” 
or the presence of ridges and depressions occasioned by scanty feeding 
and lack of comfort. Speaking of the age of the barrows, there is 10 
doubt that they are the first sepulchral evidences of the existence of man 
in Britain. Pristine or priscan man, like the modern savage, grudged 
no labor less than that which was spent in piling up a huge mound. 
Mr. H. W. Mosely, naturalist to the Challenger, in recording his obser- 
vations on the Kudang tribe of Australia, living near Cape York, says 
that though they are destitute of almost everything in the way of prop- 
erty, having neither perforated stones to hel p them dig roots, as have the 
Bushmen, nor boomerangs, nor tomahawks, nor canoes ; living not on the 
available wallabies and phalanges, but on fish, reptiles, invertebrates, and 
vegetables; having the scantiest clothing ; being, finally, below savagery; 
as understood by, a good judge of it, Professor Nillson, in having no 
