JUNE 27, 1884.] 
we might hope to have it on the shelves of our 
libraries in six months, or a year at most, after 
it is taken. 
These remarks are made purely in the interest 
of science. Scientific investigation deals, first, 
with the elementary substances of which masses 
are composed, then with the forces which are 
at work to combine them into composite forms, 
and finally with the relations and principles 
which characterize and control organisms. 
Human society is an organism, for the right 
apprehension of which it is as essential to ac- 
cumulate facts, and by means of comparison 
and analysis to deduce the laws which govern 
social phenomena, as it is to follow the same 
method of study in any other branch of science. 
The political and commercial bearings of the 
census we do not discuss; but it is evident 
that the census of the population and material 
resources of this country has for us a special 
significance, in view of our representative form 
of government and of the unprecedented growth 
of the American people. ‘To these considera- 
tions may be added another; namely, that no 
other nation has such a heterogeneous popula- 
tion, and therefore such need of self-introspec- 
tion, in order to comprehend its true capacity, 
limitations, and destiny. The political and 
financial needs of the country minister to 
science, and promote scientific research in this 
particular direction. All that scientific men 
insist upon is, that the investigation shall be in 
competent hands, and conducted according to 
the principles and methods which have done 
so much for science in general. A census 
bureau, wisely constituted, might, with respect 
to social science, occupy a relation, and perform 
a work, similar to that of the Smithsonian 
institution in the domain of the natural and 
physical sciences. 
HEAD WATERS OF THE ATNA OR COP- 
PER RIVER.! 
Very little has been known of this river, 
which enters the Pacific in about latitude 60° 
north, longitude 145° west. Several prospect- 
ors were left there tomake explorations last 
year, and will be called for this summer. The 
Ah-tena or Atnah Tinneh Indians reside on its 
banks, and from its bed have been taken nu- 
merous pieces of native copper resembling that 
of the Lake Superior region. The Wrangell 
Voleano is situated near it, about a hundred 
miles from its mouth. 
In crossing the Chilkat portage from the head 
1 Communicated by authority of the superintendent of the 
U. S. coast and geodetic survey. 
SCIENCE. 
179 
of Lynn Canal to the head waters of the Lewis 
branch of the Yukon, the head waters of another 
stream, called the Altsek River, are crossed. 
The natives allege that this stream falls into the 
sea; and on Tebienkoff’s charts the mouth of 
the Altsek River is placed on the ocean-coast 
just north-west from Mount Fairweather, in the 
bed of the Grand Plateau Glacier. The observa- 
tions of the U. S. coast-survey party, under my 
charge, in 1874 showed that no river from the 
interior could enter the Pacific between Cape 
Spencer and Yakutat Bay ; all the depressions 
of the St. Elias Alps being filled with glaciers. 
In recent charts the Altsek has therefore been 
connected by a dotted line with the White 
River, one of the branches of the Yukon. I 
have for some time suspected that the Altsek 
was the head of the Copper or Atna River, but 
until lately have had no evidence sufficiently 
weighty to make it desirable to alter the charts. 
A recent letter from Dr. Arthur Krause states 
that his Indian guides told him that they had 
descended the Altsek to salt water, where there 
was a small village of Tlinkit Indians. This 
makes it certain that the Altsek and Atna rivers 
are continuous ; for the Chilkhaat village at the 
mouth of the Atna is the only one answering 
to the situation, and the westernmost of all 
the Tlinkit villages, being separated from most 
of the others by a wide stretch of unoccupied 
coast. 
This determination is of much importance. 
It determines the Atna River to be over four 
hundred miles in length, and the longest river 
falling into the Pacific between the Fraser in 
British Columbia and the Aliaskan peninsula. 
The opportunity for a most interesting explo- 
ration is here evident. The explorer need only 
take a couple of good canoes or portable boats 
up the Chilkat River, and across the portage to 
the Altsek, and float down the latter. Within 
a couple of days of the mouth of the Atna is the 
trading-post of Fort Constantine at Port Etches, 
commonly known as Nuchek, where supplies 
could be had and arrangements made for the 
trading company’s vessel to convey the party 
to St. Paul, Kadiak Island, whence transpor- 
tation to San Francisco could be had without 
difficulty, at some time during the autumn. 
Wan. H. Dat. 
THE ETOWAH MOUNDS. 
In Science of April 11 is an article by Mr. 
W. H. Holmes, on certain engraved shells and 
figured plates of copper found in southern 
mounds. As some of the most interesting of 
these articles were obtained from one of the 
