250 General Notes. [ April, 
no trace existed, identified the great temple of Apollo, and discovered 
the treasure chambers of another unknown temple, filled with innumer- 
able votive offerings. He says that his last three years’ excavations have 
surpassed those of the seven preceding years. Dr. Schliemann has 
followed up his excayations upon what he supposed to be the site of 
ancient Troy, by excavations upon the site of Mykene. Mykenz is the 
most ancient city in Greece. It is identified with the poems of Homer, 
and Dr. Schliemann supposes that he has found the tombs of Agamem- 
non, Clytemnestra, and other Homeric personages. But whether he has 
or not, he has found and opened tombs which, from their cyclopean struct- 
ure, belong to a very early period of Greek civilization. His excava- 
tions, which have been extensive, disclose the general topography of this 
very ancient and wealthy city, the monumental and other remains of 
which he carries back to 1200 8. c., the period to which the Homeric 
poems are usually ascribed. 
In the United States the Coast Survey has made careful soundings in 
the Gulf of Mexico ; the Hydrographic Bureau has assisted in correcting 
the charts of the West India Islands; the survey of the lakes has been car- 
ried on by the United States Engineer Corps; Colonel Ludlow’s report of 
his reconnaissance from Carrol in Montana to the Yellowstone National 
Park has been published; the explorations of Lieutenant Wheeler west 
of the one hundredth meridian have been continued; Lieutenant Berg- 
land has completed the examination of the Colorado River; Professor 
Hayden’s explorations and other work have been carried on; Major 
Powell’s expedition organized six field parties which surveyed much of 
Utah and Nevada. Under the direction of the Smithsonian Institution 
Judge J. G. Swan, of Portland, Oregon, has made a very interesting col- 
lection, illustrating the arts and industries of the Indian tribes, both o 
Western Oregon and Washington Territory. The Signal Service 
Corps, under the able direction of General Albert J. Meyer, is making 
rapid advances toward a complete knowledge of the conditions and 
causes of the American climate. It has nearly completed the most ex- 
tensive collection of altitudes of places in North America which has 
ever been gathered. The list includes several thousand profiles, repre- 
senting almost every railroad and canal. From this and other data 1t 18 
making a relief model of North America on a large scale. 
The Arctic event of the year has been the return of the English expe- 
dition, the Alert and the Discovery, under Sir George Nares, from the 
attempt to penetrate the Pole by the way of Smith’s Sound. Regarded 
from a geographical and scientific point of view, the expedition was 4 
success. I said in my annual address several years ago that to reach the 
Pole was not the main object in an Arctic expedition ; that that was 4 
mere geographical feat, to which necessarily great éclat would be at- 
tached; but that the real object of such an expedition was to explore the 
Arctic region in every direction, as far as possible, to obtain scientific 1n- 
