80 



8CIEJSTCE. 



[Vol. VII., No. 155 



guesses as the ; Golden City,' Colorado, to which you 

 called attention some time ago. 



J. King Goodrich. 



Smitbson. inst., Washington, Jan. 13. 



Cliff-picture in Colorado. 



The accompanying print is from a photograph of a 

 remarkable formation which may be deemed worthy 

 of mention. The original photographic print was 

 sent to the military academy, about twelve years 

 ago, by Capt. (then Lieut.) George S. Anderson, sixth 

 U. S. cavalry. I have lately obtained from Captain 

 Anderson the following statement in regard to the 

 object. His statement is from memory, after the 

 lapse of a dozen years ; but it is not probable that 

 there is any material error in it, as he went to con- 

 siderable trouble to secure the photograph. The 

 natural picture is on the face of the sandstone cliff 

 forming the west bluff of the Purgatoire Eiver, 

 Colorado, twenty miles from its mouth, and twenty- 

 five miles from Fort Lyons. The total height of the 

 cliff at the point is about seventy feet above the bed 

 of the river. The picture is about thirty-five feet 

 above the stream, with twenty-five feet of vertical 

 cliff above it. The talus of the cliff extends up about 

 thirty feet, so that there are about five feet of vertical 

 wall between the picture and the loose rock below. 



The extreme length of the picture is at least seven 

 feet. The cliff is composed of brownish-red sand- 

 stone : the picture at the surface is of a much darker 

 color, which color gradually passes into the uniform 

 color of the rock, at a distance of 2£" or 3" from sur- 

 face, as shown by detachable fragments. Copies of 

 the photograph were sent, at the time it was taken, 

 to Prof. Joseph Henry, Professor Dana, arid to 

 Darwin. Professor Henry asked, "Can it be any 

 thing else than a work of Indian art?'' Professor 

 Dana thought the color due to iron stains, and the 

 outline accidental. Darwin hesitated to express an 

 opinion, but dissented from Professor Dana. Colonel 

 Kendrick. formerly professor at the military acad- 

 emy, expressed the same opinion as did Professor 

 Dana. 



The figure is remarkably distinct and well defined 

 for the result of accident ; but, if Professor Henry's 

 idea be rejected, there seems no other explanation. 



S. E Tillman. 



West Point, N.Y. 



The English sparrow. 



A European ornithological journal recently con- 

 tained the following testimony in regard to the spar- 

 row (Pyrgita domestica). from the pen of Dr. Schleh, 

 professor of agriculture at the College of agriculture, 

 Herford, Germany. Dr. Schleh has paid a great 

 deal of attention to this matter, and believes the 

 sparrow a pest on the continent, voluminous evidence 

 of which he is said to have brought forward in his 

 small treatise entitled 1 Der nutze und schaden des 

 Sperlings (P. domesticus) im haushalte der natur.' 



By examining the crops of a great number of 

 nestling sparrows sent to him from different parts of 

 the country, he found that young sparrows, while 

 in the nest and for a week after having left it, sub- 

 sist entirely on insects, grubs, etc. Two weeks after 

 leaving the nest, their food still consists of 43 per 

 cent of animal food ; a week later of 31 per cent, and 

 after that age of only 19 per cent, of animal in- 

 gredients. But as soon as they become independent 

 of their parents, they prefer seeds, and subsist almost 

 entirely on grain, fruit, and the buds of trees. Dr. 

 Schleh, however, mentions some interesting in- 

 stances regarding some specimens which seemed to 

 have a peculiar taste for the seeds of weeds which 

 often become a great plague to the agriculturist. In 

 one crop he found the considerable number of 321 

 whole seeds of Stellaria media (Vill.), in another 43 

 seeds of Atriplex patulum (L.), in a third 66 seeds of 

 Setaria verticillata. Some individuals also have a 

 special liking for certain insects. Thus he found in 

 one crop 90 specimens of Haltica affinis (Gyll.) : four 

 other sparrows had eaten almost nothing else but a 

 certain kind of beetle, Anisoplia fructicola (F.). 



Ernest Ingersoll. 



Equality in ability of the young of the human 

 species. 



The review of a recent work on geometry, in 

 Science, Jan. 1, is very justly criticised by W. R. in 

 the number for Jan. 8. 



Nothing is more fallacious than that ancestors 

 have much to do with natural endowments : en- 

 vironment has much, and pre-natal influences 

 probably most of all, in determining mental qualities. 

 Physical traits are to some extent traceable to an- 

 cestry ; but the whole history of the race, and of our 

 country in particular, is a refutation of the much 

 studied hereditary genius, or transmitted mental 

 quality. 



Even the writer's comparison is unfortunate. 

 Nothing seems more like chance than the develop- 

 ment of a race-horse. When the truth is known of 

 our most celebrated mile-in-two-fourteen trotters, 

 they will be found to have been picked up here and 

 there from the peddler's cart or from the farm. 

 Their qualities accidentally discovered, and fictitious 

 pedigrees made up for them, they have never left a 

 racing progeny behind them. 



I fully a^ree with N. E. in saying, " Better assume 

 that the young are born equal in ability, and in their 

 early training . . . give them an equal chance to de- 

 velop into mechanics, store-keepers, artists, farmers, 

 or lawyers ; " but by all means give them a chance to 

 follow the bent of their intellect as soon as they are 

 old enough to differentiate it, as, for instance, in their 

 college courses. P. J. Farnsworth. 



Clinton, Io., Jan. 12. 



