Notes on the Geology of the Southwest. — Hill. 367 
in the alternating beds of the Trinity division of the Comanche 
series, and a suite of specimens has recently been forwarded to 
Washington for the educational series of the U. S. Geological sur- 
vey by Mr. "Wilson Davidson. European friends inform me that 
this form is very characteristic of the Aptian horizon of that coun- 
try. The most remarkable foraminifer of the Comanche series, 
however, is the large strawberry-shaped form which I described 
lately in the American Journal of Science, which occurs associated 
with the last "mentioned species in greatest abundance. I am in- 
formed by friends at Gottingen that this is a new genns. I shall 
be glad to aid any student who will undertake the systematic study 
of the Foraminifera of the -Cretaceous beds of Texas.* 
Recent Indian Work-Shops of Central Texas. No country can 
present such ideal conditions for aboriginal nomadic existence as 
the lower Cretaceous hills of central Texas, and here the Coman- 
ches, Huecos, Lipan and Kiowas for many centuries lived what must 
have been a most perfect savage life. In these plateaus and mesas 
is an extensive development of flint nodules, a clear, translucent 
variety, resembling in every lithological aspect the Cretaceous 
flints of Europe. The region has many springs and water holes, 
and near any of them can be found work-shops where the Indian 
manufactured spear and arrow heads. The prevalent method 
seems to have been to rudely fashion the nodules into ' ' turtle 
backs" at the flint beds usually near the escarpments of the mesas, 
and then to convey their unfinished products to the water holes 
where the}- could be finally shaped at leisure. 
Near an old Comanche trail in western Travis county nearly 
every flint seems to have been broken or tested, and numerous 
"failures" are found which the old school archaeologist would 
vow are perfect types of European paleolithic implements. 
I have obtained numerous evidences that their implements were 
manufactured in this century, not only from the fact that the im- 
plements are always on the surface and never buried but from 
ocular witnesses to the fact that the Comanches and other tribes 
actually used them in their warfare with the white men. 
The Tertiary basin of the Lover Ri<> Grande. I have recently 
devoted much time to the study of the faulted mountain structure 
*It will be gratifying t otlie friends of science to know that Prof. W. 
B. Clarke of John Hopkins is undertaking a systematic study of the 
North American Cretaceous Echinodermata. Not a single group of our 
magnificent Cretaceous fauna has as yel been presented in a systematic 
manner. 
