1883. | ; Anthropology. 687 
back with a peculiar growth of hooked bristles, which tend to 
secure the objects placed there, and to retain them until they shall 
ave become firmly united or rooted to the mass. The crab is 
seemingly aware of the fact that detached or lacerated por- 
tions of polyps and sponges are capable of further growth and 
development.— American. 
ANTHROPOLOGY. '! 
American Hero Mytus.—Dr. Daniel G. Brinton is the author 
of a new work on American hero myths, published in Philadel- 
phia by H. C. Watts & Co. Although professing to deal with 
the great heroes, Michabo, Ioskeha, Quetzalcoatl and Tezcatli- 
poca, Itzamina, Kukulcan, Viracocha, Votan, Gucumatz, Bochico, 
&c.,, the work has a wider scope and includes the whole 
of a national hero, their mythical teacher and civilizer, often 
identified with the supreme deity and creator, who appeared 
among the ancestors of the tribe, gave them precious advice and 
gifts and disappeared, leaving hopes of his return. As a rule, 
each is a twin, or one of four brothers burn at one birth, gener- 
ally at the cost of the mother’s life, who is a virgin, or at least 
not impregnated by man. The hero struggles with his brother, 
or one of his brothers, often involving the universe in repeated 
destructions. 
In the words of Dr. Brinton : “ All of these myths are trans- 
Parent stories of a simple people to express in intelligible terms 
the daily struggle that is ever going on between day and night, 
between light and darkness, between storm and sunshine.” This 
thought is brought out from page to page in a series of charming 
Surprises which carries the reader’s attention onward to the end 
of the book. : j 
"Edited by Professor Oris T. MASON, 1305 Q street, N. W., Washington, D. C. 
