SCIENCE. 
r 23, and was examined, with the following 
esting results : 
ANALYSIS. 
Temperature = 58° F. 
Specific Gravity, = 1.006819. 
GRAINS PER 
SOLIDS. GALLON. 
Sodic Carbonate, 4.160 
Calcic Carbonate 23.616 
Magnesic Carbonate 569 
Ferrous Carb mate .081 
Sodic Chlotlde 27.312 
Sodic Sulphate 4-844 
Potassic Sulphate 9-730 
Calcic Sulphate 67.231 
Baric Sulphate trace. 
Magnetic Sulphate 264.505 
Aluminic Oxide .034 
Ammonia tra> e. 
Silicic Oxide .038 
Organic Matters 1.178 
4°3 2 98 
CUBIC INCHES 
GASES. PER GALLON. 
Carbonic Anhydride 23.178 
Nitrogen 4.330 
Oxygen 1.493 
Hydrogen Sulphide trace. 
29.001 
Not enough thus far is known of the water to 
enable me to present any reliable data concerning 
its therapeutic value ; but physicians here and else- 
where, who have tried it, pronounce it an exceed- 
ingly valuable water. 
Missouri School of Mines, 
Rolla, November 26, 1880. 
THE ANTHROPOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 
The Anthropological Society, of Washington, met on 
Tuesday evening, December 7, in the Smithsonian Insti- 
tution, Professor Otis T. Mason in the chair. The fol- 
lowing papers were announced : “ Superstitions,” by Mr. 
A. S. Gatschet, and “ Savage and Civilized Orthoepy,” 
by Professor Lester F. Ward. Mr. Gatschet, after giv- 
ing the definitions of different authors and finding them 
too narrow, ascribed to superstition the following mean- 
ing : A belief in a physical power operating either within 
or without us, acting miraculously to affect our bodies or 
our minds, and which can be influenced to grant our re- 
quests. The word is derived from super stare, to sur- 
vive. There are two kinds of superstition, the religious, 
relating to the world of spirits, and that of the physical 
nature, relating to all the phenomena of sense. It is hard 
to draw the line where religion ends and superstition be- 
gins, but the latter most generally represents the forces 
of nature as deified or anthropomorphic. The existence 
of superstition is manifested in names of gods, those of 
the American gods representing the sun, moon, and 
forces of nature. 
Symbolism plays an important part in this connection, 
as well as the cultus of dreams, augurytaboo, omens and 
prognostics ; such as cheiromancy and fortune-telling, 
hunting and fishing signs, witchcraft, medical jetishes, 
meteoric showers, comets, amulitism, etc. 
The causes of superstition are mental inertia and ignor- 
ance of the real causes of things, coupled with the insa- 
tiable desire to account for phenomena. Isolation is 
also a very fruitful source of these beliefs. They are 
valuable to us only when we can trace their origin ; then 
they lead to a knowledge of savage psychology, and are 
of very great use. The author ot the paper illustra’ed 
the various points taken up by many myths and super- 
stitions from our Indians and other sources. 
Mr. Gatschet, having spent several years in personal 
contact with the aboriginal mind, is very competent to 
form an opinion as to the rationale of our Indian super- 
stitions. 
Dr. Morgan took the ground that superstition is natu- 
ral to our race, having found in his practice that few of 
his patients were free from it. 
Mr. Mason drew attention to the worthlessness of 
these innumerable stories unless they are brought to- 
gether in classes, so that out of them some clue may be 
found to their origin. Every intelligent mortal passes 
his life between two worlds, the known and the unknown. 
Between these two is a border land, where superstition 
dwells. Its inhabitants are different for different individ- 
uals or tribes, and vary with our growing years. For 
Mr. Haeckel it is peopled with atom-souls, and, for the 
savage, with the concrete souls of things. 
NEW YORK ACADEMY OF SCIENCES. 
THE MAN OF THE CAVES. 
By Professor W. Boyd Dawkins, F.R.S., Owens College, 
England.* 
The questions which we have to put to ourselves are 
these : At what time in the geological history of the earth 
did man appear? and what manner of man was he? The 
answers to these questions are to be found in the recent 
discoveries, in the deposits of ancient rivers, and in the ac- 
cumulations in caverns, which have been explored in the 
Old World during the last 60 years. Inquiry into the anti- 
quity of man falls within well defined limits in point oftime. 
Since there were no living species of the higher mammalia 
in the earlier stages of the tertiary period, the Eocene and 
the Miocene, it is hopeless to look for a highly specialized 
being such as man, nor in the succeeding Pliocene is it 
l.kely that he will be discovered, since but very few of the 
living, higher mammalian forms were then on the earth. 
When we examine the next stage, or Pleistocene, a period 
characterized by the presence of numerous living mamma- 
lia in both the New and Old Worlds, the field is fairly 
opened before us for our inquiry. The conditions of life at 
that time were precisely those in which man would be ex- 
pected to exist, and it will be my object to put before you 
the evidence as to the earliest man of which we have any 
certain knowledge. 
In the Pleistocene period the physical conditions of Eu- 
rope were wholly' unlike those which it now presents. The 
sea-board of the Atlantic reached to the ioo-fathom line, or 
100 miles to the west of the coast of Ireland. The British 
Isles formed a part of the Continent of Europe, and the 
area of the North Sea formed a shallow valley, abounding 
in mammalia of various kinds. The Mediterranean Sea 
also was much smaller than it is now, a land barrier extend- 
ing North into Spain by the way of Gibraltar, and another 
passing in the direction of Malta, Sicily, and Italy, while 
what is now the bed of the Adriatic Sea was dry land, and 
most of the islands in the Aigean Sea were the tops of 
ranges of hills overlooking rich and fertile valleys. The 
living mammals appearing on this tract of land consisted 
of Southern species — the hippopotamus, spotted hyena and 
: others — which ranged as far north as Yorkshire. 
A second division is composed of the Northern animals, 
such as the reindeer, the musk sheep, and the like, which 
ranged as far to the South as the Alps and the Pyrenees, 
while yet a third division, such as the stag, bison, and horse, 
ranged over nearly the whole of Middle and Southern Eu- 
rope. The remains of these animals, lying side by side 
with extinct species, such as the mammoth and the woolly 
rhinoceros, characterise the Pleistocene deposits of Europe. 
There were great climatal changes in Europe during the 
Pleistocene age. The temperature gradually lowered, and 
in the North large masses of ice spread over certain regions. 
When the temperature was lowest the Northern animals ad- 
vanced furthest to the South, and when the temperature was 
warmest the Southern animals advanced furthest to the 
North, and from the intimate association of their remains 
in ancient river deposits and in caves may be irtferred that 
the Winters were very cold and the Summers very warm 
* Lecture delivered before the Academy, December 6, 1880. 
