308 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. VII. , No. 165 



to the family had before been seen." Should the 

 student wish to investigate still further, he will find 

 io de Candolle's treatise the names of several Spanish 

 and other authorities. Nopal. 

 New York, March 29. 



Schwatka's Along Alaska's great river. 



The author of the review of Schwatka's work on 

 the Yukon (p. 294) is evidently ill-informed as to the 

 history and present state of the mapping of that 

 river, when he states that Raymond 'surveyed' it from 

 Fort Yukon to its mouth, and supposes that the map 

 of Raymond is the ' best in existence ' of the lower 

 Yukon. It is probable that he derives his impression 

 from Schwatka's work ; that gentleman, like many 

 military men, preferring to ignore or affect contempt 

 cf any work done outside of military circles. The 

 fact is, that Raymond's map has at present merely 

 an historical value, and was originally merely one 

 step in the many by which an approximate sketch of 

 the course of that great stream has been arrived at. 

 The first explorations were by the Russians, and are 

 summarized in the map of Zogoskin, which, for the 

 part included in it (except at the mouth of the river), 

 has not been materially changed by any one, though 

 positions have been better determined, and details 

 added or subtracted. The river between the end of 

 the Zogoskin map and Fort Yukon, and the delta, 

 were mapped by the Western union telegraph expe- 

 dition, whose work as to detail is fuller than any 

 thing subsequent. They also sketched the upper 

 river, but it was reserved for Raymond to correct 

 the astronomical positions of important points, and 

 thus modify the general course ; to Schwatka and 

 Krause, to furnish better details of the Lewis branch 

 and head waters; to Nelson, to do the same for the 

 delta, and Lieutenant Allen for the Tananah water- 

 shed. The credit due to each cannot be monopolized 

 by any man or set of men, and it does not impair any 

 man's reputation to do justly by his forerunners. 



Wm. H. Dall. 



Smithsonian institution. 

 March 27. 



A swindler abroad again. 



Please give place to an advertisement of a fraud 

 who has just left Oskaloosa. He came on the 6th, 

 remained six days, and left without having caused 

 sufficient suspicion for any one to say any thing. He 

 professes to be Prof. Henry S Williams of Cornell 

 university, N. Y., a captain on the retired list of the 

 U. S. army, — retired for disabilities resulting from 

 wounds received from the Indians three days after 

 General Custer fell. He is now representing the 

 Smithsonian institution as a sort of an examiner, 

 looking after books and specimens deposited at 

 different places. He also represents that Cornell has 

 a fund which makes it possible for them to sell for 

 fifty dollars a set of fossils equal to sets sold by Ward 

 for eight hundred and fifty dollars, and that they only 

 want five dollars cash to pay for boxing and labelling, 

 the remainder to be paid from time to time in local 

 fossils, for which reasonable prices will be allowed. 

 He contracted two sets here, but received the five 

 dollars on but one of them. 



He is about five feet eight inches high, weighs 

 about one hundred and forty pounds, carries his right 

 arm as though stiff, wears a glove on that hand, has 

 light- brown straight hair, mustache, blue eyes, a 



large head with prominent forehead, so that his eyes 

 seem a little sunken, and uses tobacco and whiskey 

 tolerably freely for a professional man. We know 

 he has a whole right arm and hand, and it is quite 

 possible nothing is the matter with it. He talks very 

 freely and accurately of fossils, books, and men, can 

 give minute details of events in Indian warfare of 

 ten and more years ago, which some of our citizens 

 know to be literally true. He spends his money very 

 freely, and seems to have plenty of it. 



There is a general feeling that he worked some 

 one for one hundred and eighty dollars, but, if so, 

 whoever it was will not tell it. The amount is in- 

 dicated, because it is rumored he draws one hundred 

 and eighty dollars per month from the army. I can- 

 not find who started it. If he has not done so, he 

 certainly missed a good chance. A despatch from 

 Humboldt to the Des Moines Register says he has 

 been there and got about one hundred dollars. 



Erasmus Haworth. 



Penn college, Oskaloosa, Io., 

 March 24. 



Bancroft's History of Alaska. 



In your review of Bancroft's ' Alaska,' published 

 yesterday, you speak of the transfer of that region, 

 and the surrender of the despotic sway of the Russian 

 American company, only to be renewed by one of 

 our own, or, to use your words, " while the monopoly 

 which succeeded, though more confined in scope than 

 that of the Russian company, does not differ in its 

 essential details, and is still in operation." 



The entire area of Alaska is to-day. and has been 

 since the purchase, open and free to all comers, in so 

 far as the fur-trade is concerned, with the single 

 exception of that reservation of the government for 

 the protection of the seal-iife on the Pribylov Islands, 

 in Bering Sea : these small islets are completely 

 isolated, and far removed from contact with the 

 trade of that region, and are practically unknown to 

 everybody outside of their narrow limits, except the 

 officers of the government and the employees of the 

 A. C. Co. 



Competing traders are found at every little post 

 in Alaska to-day where the fur-trade will warrant 

 the establishment of the smallest trader and his out- 

 fit. There never has been the slightest interference 

 with the prosecution of the fur-trade in Alaska since 

 1867 by any monopoly whatsoever. 



Henry W. Elliott. 



Smithsonian institution, March 27. 



[The statements of the above letter, in so far as 

 they are accurate, are theoretically true : the state- 

 ment of the reviewer, in his judgment, better repre- 

 sents the social and commercial facts, as regards the 

 whole territory, except the small area about Sitka. — 

 Rev.] 



Names of the Canadian Rocky Mountain peaks. 



An error in my article, printed in Science, vii. No. 

 162, is kindly pointed out by Dr. George M. Dawson 

 of the Canadian geological survey, which I am glad 

 to correct for your readers. Dr. Dawson tells me 

 that the peaks of the Rocky Mountains, Hooker, Bal- 

 four, Brown, etc., were not named by the botanist 

 Douglas, as I stated, but by Dr. Hector, now in 

 charge of the geological survey of New Zealand, who 

 in 1857-59 was attached to Captain Palliser's expedi- 

 tion into the north-west. Ernest Ingersoll. 



New Haven, March 25. 



