January 2, 1885.] 



SCIENCE. 



u The whale tribe (Balaenidae) is divided into the 

 genus whale and the genus cachalot (sperm whale). 

 The genus whale produces the baleen," etc. 



This travesty of truth was evidently compiled from 

 text-books of fifty years ago, and, although somewhat 

 amusing from its complete erroneousness, cannot be 

 too severely criticised. Cetology is certainly not in 

 so advanced a condition as could be wished ; but there 

 are numerous recent works in which the outlines of 

 the subject are correctly laid down, and from which 

 our author might have gathered facts, and not fictions, 

 with which to preface his chapter upon whalebone. 



Frederick W. True. 



U. S. national museum. 



Man in the stone age. 



In Science, iv. 469, Prof. Henry W. Haynes takes 

 me up sharply in reference to an opinion I expressed 

 about the epoch of the appearance of man, properly 

 so called, in prehistoric time in Europe, and calls 

 this opinion ' a most amazing travesty of the views 

 of Mortillet.' 



Professor Haynes tells us that he gave a critical 

 notice of Mortillet' s work, ' Le prehistorique; anti- 

 quite de l'homme,' in Science : it is probable, there- 

 fore, that he read that book. But it is evident, that, 

 if he did, he has forgotten it: otherwise he would not 

 repeat that Mortillet takes the station St. Acheul 

 as typical of the oldest stone age, inasmuch as he 

 definitely rejects it as being of mixed later types, and 

 substitutes the station of Chelles (op. cit., 133). He 

 would also have remembered that Mortillet denies, in 

 so many words, that the anthropoid then living was 

 man as we understand the term. These words are, 

 "Nous nous retrouvons, done, en presence de l'an- 

 thropopitheque, dont j'ai deniontre 1' existence,'' etc. 

 (p. 248). Passing to the next age or epoch, the Mous- 

 terien, he asserts that it, too, was characterized by 

 this race of anthropopitheci (p. 339) ; while in the 

 third epoch, that of Iolutre, he leaves the question 

 open, denying that any traces of man or anthropoid 

 have been discovered (p. 392). 



This brings us late, very late, in paleolithic time, 

 without an osteologic trace of any being who should 

 properly be called man; for it would indeed be a 

 travesty to apply that name to a creature without 

 language, without religion, and without social com- 

 pacts. If the question is to be any thing beyond one 

 of word-splitting, these psychological characteristics 

 must be connoted by the word ' man ; ' for in all 

 ethnological study they almost alone occupy us, as 

 Peschel has well shown in his chapter, ' Die stellung 

 des menschen in der schopfung ' (Vdlkerkunde, ein- 

 leitung). Yet Mortillet himself denies them to his 

 anthropopithecus. Daxiel G. Brintox, M.D. 



Media, Penn., Doc. 13. 



Dr. Haacke's discovery of the eggs of Echidna. 



In the Zoolor/ischer anzeiger of Dec. 1 appears 

 an extremely interesting letter from Dr. Wilhelm 

 Haacke, director of the South-Australian museum 

 at Adelaide. It is dated Sept. 8, and contains an 

 account of the writer's independent discovery of the 

 oviparous character of the monotremes four days 

 before Professor Liversedge transmitted Mr. Cald- 

 well's famous cable from Queensland. 



On Aug. 3 last, Dr. Haacke received from Kan- 

 garoo Island, a point about one day's journey from 

 Adelaide, a living female Echidna hystrix. With 

 the deliberateness characteristic of his race, he did 

 not examine the animal until Aug. 25. He then as- 

 certained that there were two lateral folds of the 



mammary pouch, in one of which he felt a small ob- 

 ject. In the expectation of rinding a young Echidna, 

 he brought it to light; and, to his astonishment, it 

 proved to be an egg, with a membranous shell like 

 that of some of the reptiles, and measuring about 

 two centimetres in diameter. Owing, probably, to the 

 long confinement of the animal, the egg was decom- 

 posed, and broke apart under a slight pressure. 



On Sept. 2 this important discovery was quietly com- 

 municated to a meeting of the Royal society of South 

 Australia ; and the Adelaide Advertiser of Sept. 4, 

 also the Register of Sept. 5, published the fact in their 

 reports of the meeting. In the same number of the 

 Register appeared a cable-message from London, 

 announcing Mr. Caldwell's discovery of the eggs of 

 Ornithorhynchus ; in which message, probably through 

 a telegraph-operators error, the word 'viviparous' 

 had been substituted for 'oviparous.' Dr. Haacke 

 immediately wrote to the Register in a letter printed 

 on the 6th, pointing out the probable error, and the 

 singular coincidence of the independent discoveries 

 of Mr. Caldwell and himself. 



On Sept. 7 the Register published an extended ac- 

 count of Mr. Caldwell's researches in Australia, and 

 added in a shorter note, — 



"It may also be observed that the announcement 

 which has caused such a sensation among European 

 scientists was made from Queensland on Aug. 29, or a 

 few days after the discovery by Dr. Haacke." 



Dr. Haacke closes his paper in the Anzeiger with 

 an expression of pleasure that his discovery had met 

 with such an unexpectedly rapid confirmation at the 

 hands of another observer. 



This adds another to the numerous coincidences 

 in the history of scientific discoveries. "When it is 

 remembered that Mr. Caldwell, at the time of his dis- 

 covery, was in the interior, and may have been some 

 distance from any telegraphic station, it seems prob- 

 able that his observation and Dr. Haacke's were only 

 a day or so apart. At all events, each investigator 

 is entitled to the full credit of independent discovery, 

 or perhaps, in view of Professor Gill's recent letter to 

 Science on this subject, we may better say confirma- 

 tion of an old truth that has been disregarded for 

 half a century. After so long a period of ignorance 

 regarding this most important question concerning 

 the monotremes, it is certainly very extraordinary 

 that at points so distant from each other there 

 should have been made, simultaneously, observations 

 upon different genera, either of which practically 

 solved the question for all time. 



Henry F. Osborx. 



Princeton, N.J., Dec. 19. 



Artificial wampum. 



During a discussion upon wampum, at the Mon- 

 treal meeting of the British association, I alluded to 

 the fact that there is a wampum manufactory at 

 Paskack, N.J. In the same discussion Major Powell 

 remarked, that, according to his belief, none of the 

 cylindrical beads of which the belts then on exhi- 

 bition were composed had been made by Indians. 



Since my return I have visited the manufactory 

 mentioned above, and I will give a hasty sketch of 

 the same. It is situated at Paskack. on the Hack en- 

 sack Kiver, and is conducted by four * Campbell 

 brothers,' the youngest of whom is about seventy 

 years of age. 



According to their account, the business has been 

 in their family about four generations. During the 

 life of their grandfather it was situated at Tenack. 

 now Edgewater; and my informant remembers when 

 his grandfather used to go in a boat toRockawaw and 



