would cause it to move off with an ever-increasing velocity through infinite space. This is contrary to the first law of motion, which asserts that a body does not change its state of motion unless acted upon by external force." That this argument is based upon the assumption of the equality of the action and reaction between bodies pressing against one another, seems to follow from the consideration that other. wise the "residual force," due to the possible inequality of the action and reaction of the gravitational stress between the mountain and the remainder of the earth, might be regarded as neutralized by an opposite inequality in the action and reaction of the stress at their surface of contact. Even, therefore, if Newton's extension of his experimental result to forces acting at a distance were regarded as valid, the third law could not be regarded as deduced from the first. It would only be shown to be but partially hypothetical. But since, in the present state of dynamics, the laws of motion must be regarded as applicable to particles, Newton's argument, though valid when they were considered applicable to extended bodies, can no longer be admitted; for the uniformity of the motion of a body free from the action of external force is itself a deduction, which can be made only by assuming the third law in its most general form.

3. Sufficiency of the Laws of Motion.

The best test of the sufficiency of the laws of motion is the question, Can they give by deduction the greatest of all physical laws, the conservation of energy? This law may be proved, by the aid of the second and third laws of motion, to hold in the case of any system of particles which is neither giving energy to, nor receiving energy from, external bodies, provided the stresses between the particles act in the lines joining them and are functions of their distances. It has a so been proved by experiment to hold in a very large number of cases in which the laws of the forces acting are un known, the energy disappearing in one form and the energy appearing simultaneously in another form being measured. The amount of such experimental evidence is so large that no doubt is now entertained that the law of the conservation of energy is applicable to all natural forces. Hence the fundamental hypotheses of dynamics should either include this law or give it by deduction.

more com

Although many writers state that this law may be deduced from the laws of motion, Lodge' is the only one, so far as I am aware, who claims to make the deduction. This he does in a passage beginning as follows: "All this, indeed, in a much more complete and accurate form plete because it involves the non destruction of energy, as well as its non-creation follows from Newton's third law of motion, provided we make the assumptions (justified by experiment)," etc. It is unnecessary to quote farther; for when assumptions justified by experiment are called in to the aid of the third law, additional fundamental hypotheses are thereby selected.

The second law of motion enables us to take the first step in the deduction of the conservation of energy. The proof is so well known that I may simply cite that given by Thomson and Tait,' resulting in the familiar equation:

Σ(Xx+Yy+Zx) = = Σm (x x + y y + zz),

in which the first member represents the rate at which work is being done by the forces acting on the particles of a sys

1 Elementary Mechanics (1885), p. 82.

' Treatise on Nat. Phil. (1879), Vol. I., Part 1, p. 269.

tem, and the second is equal to the rate at which the kinetic energy of the system is being increased. It is usually called the equation of vis viva, and, having been deduced from the second law of motion alone, is applicable to all forces, whether conservative or not.

3

Newton gave this result in the Scholium to the Laws of Motion in a statement which may be paraphrased thus: Work done on any system of bodies has its equivalent in work done against friction, molecular forces, or gravity, together with that done in overcoming the resistance to acceleration. Thompson and Tait point out expressly that this statement of Newton's, which, owing to the form he gave it, is often referred to as his second interpretation of the third law of motion, is equivalent to the equation given above. Nevertheless, it has been interpreted as being little less than an enunciation of the law of the conservation of energy itself. Thus Tait says it "has been shown to require comparatively little addition to make it a complete enunciation of the conservation of energy;" and "What Newtou really wanted was to know what becomes of work which is spent in friction." Besant takes the same view. These writers seem to claim that Newton's statement is equivalent to what Thomson and Tait call "the law of energy in abstract dynamics," viz., "The whole work done in any time on any limited material system by applied forces is equal to the whole effect in the forms of potential and kinetic energy produced in the system, together with the work lost in friction." Of this it may certainly be said that what it wants to make it a complete enunciation of the conservation of energy is a statement as to what becomes of the work spent in friction.

6

Compare this, however, with Newton's statement, as paraphrased above, and it is at once obvious that what the latter wants to make it a complete enunciation of the conservation of energy, is a statement as to what becomes not only of work spent in friction, but also of work done against molecular forces and gravity, and of work done in overcoming the resistance to acceleration. Newton may possibly have known all this, but he does not say so; and we must therefore hold his statement to be, as Thomson and Tait point out, merely a verbal expression of the equation given above. The question of the interpretation of Newton's statement is of more than mere historical interest; for if it would bear the interpretations which have been put upon it, the law of the conservation of energy would be capable of being deduced from the second law of motion alone.

To pass from the equation of vis viva to the law of the conservation of energy, we require to know that the work done during any change of configuration of a system of particles acted upon by natural forces depends only upon the changes in the positions of the particles, and not upon the paths by which or the velocities with which they have moved from the old positions to the new. Helmholtz showed that this deduction may be "based on either of two maxims, either on the maxim that it is not possible by any

3 Treatise on Nat. Phil. (1879), Vol. I., Part 1, p. 270.

8

4 This address was written before I had seen Professor W. W. Johnson's paper on "The Mechanical Axioms, or Laws of Motion" (Bull. N. Y. Math. Soc., Vol. I., No. 6, March, 1892).

Properties of Matter (1885), p. 104, and Recent Advances in Physical Science (1876), p. 38.

6 Dynamics (1895), p. 49.

7 Garrett (Elementary Dynamics, 1886, p. 47) goes so far as to say that Newton's statement "is nothing more nor less than the enunciation of the great principle of the conservation of energy."

On the Conservatio of Force (1847): Taylor's Scientif: Memoirs. Nat. Phil. (1833), p 114.

combination whatever of natural bodies to derive an unlimited amount of mechanical force [energy], or on the assumption that all actions in nature can be ultimately referred to attractive or repulsive forces, the intensity of which depends solely upon the distances between the points by which the forces are exerted." He showed also that it was immaterial which of these maxims was assumed, as the other could be at once obtained from it. How by the aid of either of these hypotheses we pass from the equation given above to the law of the conservation of energy is of course well known. The point to which it seems necessary to draw attention is that some hypothesis is required, and that either of these is sufficient for the purpose.

As the second of Helmholtz's maxims is simply an extension of the third law of motion, and as Newton's three laws have obtained such wide usage, it would seem to be desirable to adopt the second maxim as a fourth law of motion. Were we to select the first maxim, it would be necessary to re-cast our fundamental hypotheses altogether.' Possibly it might be advantageous to take this course, to make, as Tait suggests, the laws of the conservation and the transformation of energy our fundamental hypotheses, and to banish the conception of force to the limbo of once useful things. But if Newton's laws are to be retained, they should be supplemented by the second of Helmholtz's assumptions.

3

2

It is at once obvious that this fourth law will, like the third, be independent of points of reference; and it follows that the law of the conservation of energy will hold relatively to all points by reference to which the second law holds. This conclusion is inconsistent with Newcomb's assertion that this law" assumes that we refer the motions of all the bodies whose energy is considered to some foreign body of infinite mass, from which emanate the forces which give motion to the system." According to the above, this law may of course be expressed relatively to a particle of infinite mass, and, if thus expressed, the forces which give motion to the system may be supposed to emanate from that particle. But it may also be expressed relatively either to a particle of finite mass free from the action of force, or to the centre of mass of the system itself whose energy is conserved.

4. Reduction of the Laws of Motion.

Finally, the four laws of motion may obviously be reduced to two. The first has already been seen to be a particular case of the second. The third is involved in the fourth; for when it is asserted that natural forces are attractions or repulsions, it is implied that their action and reaction are in opposite directions, and when it is asserted that they may be expressed as functions of the distances of the particles between which they act, it is implied that their action and reaction are equal. The four laws thus reduce to two, which may be enunciated somewhat as follows:The Law of Force. Relatively to any particle free from the action of force, the acceleration produced in another particle by a force is proportional to the force and has the same direction.

The Law of Stress. Natural forces may be considered to be attractions or repulsions whose magnitudes vary solely with the distances of the particles between which they act.

1 Many writers illogically select the first maxim as a fourth law. See Professor Johnson's paper cited above; also my Kinematics and Dynamics, 3456

2 Ency. Brit., 9th Ed., Art. Mechanics, § 291.

Phil. Mag., Ser. 5, Vol xxvii. (1889), p. 116.

THE GREAT LAKE BASINS.

BY P. J. FARNSWORTH.

THE problem of the origin of the Great Lakes has for a long time engaged the attention of the scientists, who have come to a variety of conclusions, none of them very satisfactory. Subsidence, ice action, glacial scooping, and President Chamberlin's theory that they were hollows made by accumulating ice bending down the earth's crust.

An article in Science of June 3 presents a more plausible theory, that they are vallies of erosion, made by some great river, giving as evidence the map of Dr. Spencer, pointing out the discoveries and probable deep pre-glacial channels leading into the St. Lawrence and the Atlantic. Professor Spencer, in his paper on High Continental Elevations, read at the Scientific Association at Toronto, 1889, sums up by saying, "The lake basins are merely closed-up portions of the ancient St. Lawrence valley and its tributaries." "The lake basins are all excavated out of Palæozoic rocks except a part of that of Lake Superior."

If we go back in geologic history to Azoic times we find that the first emergence of the continent was the V-shaped land around Hudson's Bay, an open sea below it. Next, an emergence of a point below the V and a line of height extending along the lower side of what we call the river and gulf of St. Lawrence. A sea or strait extended round the primitive land from the Atlantic to the Arctic Ocean on the north-west. After the elevation of the trough at the northwest, an inland sea was left covering Superior, Michigan, Huron, and Ontario, leading into the St. Lawrence Gulf. In time there was elevation and subsidence and flexion of

strata, as pointed out by Professor Spencer, and the great basins were left as interior seas. There was a large watershed to the north that compelled an overflow, that made its way in the deep channels that have been discovered, at some time out of Ontario, across New York, then, if there was continental elevation, making the deep channels down the valley of the St. Lawrence and far out into the Gulf. Lake Champlain was a pool in a fissure of the Azoac world, that was connected with the open channel in the Archean land.

The ice period so obstructed the old outlet that when it was melting, the superfluous waters of the great basins were poured into the Gulf of Mexico through the Illinois and Wabash rivers. When the ice disappeared, the old outlet had become obstructed by flexions of strata and mountains of drift. It is evident that Lake Michigan had a channel through Georgian Bay, and thence into Ontario. It is not yet apparent where the deep channel for the waters of Superior came in, or that it had any such. It has an insignificant but sufficient outlet through the St. Mary's River. Michigan and Huron reach Ontario over the St. Clair flats and through the shallow trough that holds Lake Erie, which probably is of post-glacial age, and then into Ontario down the hill that is being cut back by the falls of Niagara.

The great lakes were deep seas before the world was cold enough for ice, and were great basins before glaciers were possible.

One could hardly conceive how glacial ploughing coming from the north or north-east could make chasms at such angles to each other. In regard to cut of channels of erosion, it would require a river from the south-west and north-west, from Michigan and Superior, of such maguitude that great valleys or traces of them would be left. Lake Superior is 360 miles long and 150 miles wide in some places, with a

depth of 1000 feet, with a probable 100 or 200 feet more covered with sediment 600 feet above tide-water, which would make its bottom 500 feet below sea-level. To conceive it as an old river channel would require an elevation of the continent of 1500 feet above its present level. It is, moreover, surrounded by high rocky shores having few rivers coming into it, as its watershed was never large and not channeled by fjords.

There may have been an elevation of the continent, but the lakes went up with it; there was undoubtedly ice but the lakes were there before it. They are pools left by the old Azoic Sea.

Clinton, Iowa.

NOTES AND NEWS.

In the latest quarterly statement of the Palestine Exploration Fund as we learn from Nature, it is said that considerable progress is being made with the Akka-Damascus Railway, the route of which, after various expensive surveys, has been definitely decided upon. The line chosen is practically that first suggested by Major Conder, R. E. several years ago. Beginning at the great fortress of Acre, the railway will run down the plain of Acre parallel with the sea, throwing out a branch to Haifa, at the northern foot of Mount Carmel, and thence to and across the plain of Esdraelon, passing near Nazareth to Shunem and Jezreel, and through the valley of Jezreel, skirting the slope of the hills, to the river Jordan, which will be crossed within sight of Bethsbean. The Jordan here offers exceptional facilities for the erection of the railway bridge, consisting of two spans. Not only are the two opposite banks of the river formed of solid rock, but the centre of the river contains a large block of similar rock, from which each span of the bridge will be thrown to the east and west bank respectively. From the Jordan the railway will ascend the slope of the Jaulan Plateau, along the crests that close the eastern shores of the Sea of Galilee, this ascent constituting the only difficult portion of the line, but which the surveys now made show to be much easier of accomplishment than was originally anticipated. The plateau near El'Al being reached, an easy gradient will carry the line by Seil Nawa and Kesweh to Damascus. Passing through the finest plains of western and eastern Palestine, the railway will be one of great importance. The authorities of the Palestine Exploration Fund are of opinion that its construction can hardly fail to lead to important archæological discoveries, and the committee hope to make arrangements for obtaining full information respecting these.

- The Kew Bulletin for May and June, according to Nature, contains several contributions which will be of great interest to botanists and to various classes connected with the industrial applications of botany. One of these contributions is a valuable report (with a plate) by Mr. George Massee on a disease that has attacked vanilla plants in Seychelles. In the same number are printed the second of the Decades Kewenses Plantarum Novarum in Herbario Horti Regii Conservatarum, and the second decade of new orchids. An excellent illustration of the way in which the authorities at Kew seek to promote industry is afforded by a correspondence on Sansevieria fibre from Somali-land. The increased attention devoted to the production of white rope fibres in the western tropics appears to have had a stimulating effect in the East Indies, and now the production of fibre from Agave vivipara in Bombay and Manila is followed by a fibre obtained from Somaliland from a singular species of Sansevieria. This fibre was first received in this country as an "Aloe" fibre. It was soon noticed, however, that it possessed characteristics differing from all ordinary Aloe fibre, and a request was made to the Foreign Office that Colonel Stace should be invited to obtain for the Royal Gardens a small sample of the fibre, a large leaf from the plant yielding it, and, if possible, a few small plants for growing in the Kew collection. In due time the specimens arrived in excellent order, and it was found that the fibre is one of the many so-called Bowstring Hemps, and probably yielded by Sansevieria Ehrenbergii, a plant first collected by Dr. Schweinfürth. Little or nothing

66

"In

was known of it until it was described by Mr. J. J. Baker, F.R. S., in the Journal of the Linnean Society. Vol. xiv., p. 549. Its locality is there stated as "between Athara and the Red Sea." The plant is described in a letter to the Foreign Office, written by Mr. D. Morris, as a very interesting one, and he adds that its existence as a source of a valuable supply of fibre will be sure to awaken attention among commercial men in Great Britain. Messrs. Ide and Christie, writing to Mr. Morris, speak of the fibre as an excellent one of fair length and with plenty of "life." character," they say. "it strongly resembles the best Sisal hemp. with which we should have classed it but for your statement that it is derived from Sansevieria. With the exception of its color, its preparation is perfect, and, even as it is, we value it to day at £25 per ton. We are of opinion that if care were taken to improve the color a considerably higher price would be readily attainable, perhaps as much as £50 per ton, if a pure white fibre could be attained without loss of strength and lustre."

- The Harvey process of case-hardening, which has been so successfully applied to giving a hard surface to armor plates, is carried out as follows, according to Engineering: The plate to be treated is made out of mild steel, containing, say, 0.10 per cent to 0.35 per cent carbon, and, after being formed to its final shape, is laid flatwise upon a bed of finely-powdered dry clay or sand, which is deposited upon the bottom of a fire brick cell or compartment erected within the heating chamber of a suitable furnace. The upper surface of the plate is then covered with powdered carbonaceous material, which is tightly packed. Above this is a layer of sand, and over the sand is laid a heavy covering of fire-bricks. The furnace is then lighted and raised to a temperature sufficient to melt cast-iron, and this heat is maintained for a greater or lesser period, according to the amount of carbonizing to be effected. About 120 hours are said to be required for a plate 10 inches thick. On removal from the furnace such a plate is found to have had the composition of its upper surface changed. At a depth of about 3 inches from this surface the percentage of carbon has been raised by about 0.1 per cent, which increases progressively as the outer surface is neared, when the amount of carbon may rise to 1 per cent. It is said that this process, though. as will be seen, it resembles the ordinary cementation process, does not cause any blistering of the surface of the plate. This the inventor attributes to the high temperature at which it is carried out; but it is also suggested that the absence of blisters may be due to the homogeneity of the metal used, which, unlike the wrought-iron bars used in the cementation process, is free from cinders.

- An interesting addition to the much-vexed Sumero-Akkadian question has recently been made by an Ottoman scholar. Ohannes Sakissian Effendi, an official in the Treasury department at Constantinople, has issued privately the first instalment of a work intended to prove that the non-Semitic idiom of the cuneiform inscription is related linguistically to Armenian, Turkish, and ancient Egyptian. He strenuously combats the theory of the Rev. C. J. Ball, of the affinity of Akkadian and Chinese. That Akkadian or rather Sumerian was related to Turkish or to Armenian is by no means inherently improbable. We can hardly admit being convinced by the author as yet, and would prefer awaiting some ethnologic evidence before reaching a conclusion. But we cannot fail to welcome to the ranks of students of the ancient civilization of Mesopotamia the first subject of the Empire of which Mesopotamia is a part, who has busied himself with cuneiform studies Turkey has produced investigators in all branches of modern science, a classical archæologist and explorer like Hamdi Bey, a Turkish lexicographer like the late Ahmed Vefik Pacha, or a man like Tewfik Bey Ebuzzia, the historian of Turkish literature, a writer on military matters like Djeva Pasha. the present Grand Vizier, or a student of pure mathematics like Tewfik Pasha, the present minister of public works. Sakissian Effendi is the first Ottoman who, to our knowledge, has written on a subject connected with cuneiform research, and we take the appearance of his brochure as an omen that these studies will be seriously taken up at the Imperial Museum in Constantinople. A catalogue of the cuneiform objects preserved in that museum would be eagerly welcomed by the learned world.

Communications will be welcomed from any quarter. Abstracts of scientific papers are solicited, and one hundred copies of the issue containing such will be mailed the author on request in advance. Rejected manuscripts will be returned to the authors only when the requisite amount of postage accompanies the manuscript. Whatever is intended for insertion must be authenticated by the name and address of the writer; not necessarily for publication, but as a guaranty of good faith. We do not hold ourselves responsible for any view or opinions expressed in the communications of our correspondents.

Attention is called to the "Wants" column. It is invaluable to those who use it in soliciting information or seeking new positions. The name and address of applicants should be given in full, so that answers will go direct to them. The "Exchange " column is likewise open.

For Advertising Rates apply to HENRY F. TAYLOR, 13 Astor Place, New York.

THE HOPKINS SEASIDE LABORATORY.

BY DAVID S. JORDAN.

ONE of the best equipped and most favorably situated of the marine laboratories for research is the Hopkins Seaside Laboratory on Monterey Bay in California. This institution is an outgrowth from the biological departments of the Leland Stanford, Jun., University, its equipment having been provided for by the generosity of Mr. Timothy Hopkins, one of the trustees of the University. The laboratory is situated on a rocky point of land known as Point Aloha, which juts into Monterey Bay near the village of Pacific Grove. The laboratory is a two-story, frame building sixty feet by twenty. On each floor the many windows make the sides of the building virtually of glass. The lower floor is devoted to aquaria and to work in connection with aquaria. The upper floor is fitted up for advanced research, with private rooms for workers in special fields. On the lower floor are seven aquaria provided with running water, besides various glass jars and similar vessels used for the study of smaller animals.

The fauna of Monterey Bay is peculiarly rich, as the life histories of the animals of this region have been scarcely studied by zoologists. The laboratory, therefore, offers special attractions to naturalists, particularly to workers on tunicates, jelly fishes, star-fishes, fishes, and nudibranch mollusks. The material for zoological purposes is extremely abundant, and one singular feature of the life of this region is the immense size to which many animals grow as compared with the size reached by their relatives in the Atlantic.

In the aquaria I notice many specimens of salpa, large transparent tunicates, reaching a length of four or five inches. There are nudibranch mollusks (Aplysia) nearly a foot in length, and a twenty-armed star-fish (Pycnopodia) whose span covers the whole height of one side of the aquarium. This creature has been timed in making a circuit of the four sides of the aquarium, covering the distance of about nine feet in just four minutes. Immense jelly fishes which will almost fill a bushel basket are also very

common, and sea anemones, reaching a size by which the largest of the Atlantic seem like marigolds compared with sunflowers. Tunicates, chitons, limpets. sea urchins, sea anemones, octopus, and squid exist in great abundance and variety. Among the fishes are also many forms of interest in the aquaria, numerous species of blennies and sculpins abounding about the rocks. The blue hag fish (Polistotrema) occurs in great abundance. This is an eel-shaped fish about a foot to a foot and a half in length, which lives as a parasite in the bodies of other fishes. It enters at the eye or at the throat or some other soft place, and then by means of the rasp-like teeth, makes a hole in the body of its host and in time without breaking or disturbing the bones or viscera of the unfortunate animal, it will devour the entire muscular system of the fish on which it feeds. Many of the larger flounders and like fishes obtained in the Bay of Monterey are found to be half-devoured or reduced to mere hulks by the operation of this singular fish. The locality is especially favorable for the study of the viviparous surf-fishes and rock-fishes. The huge torpedo or cramp fish, which is found across the bay about Soquel, also invites investigation. As I write, a grampus 12 feet in length is brought in in a dray-wagon by a Portuguese fisherman from Monterey, while a constant stream of objects of interest comes in from the Chinese fishing camp at Point Alones. The marine flora of the Bay of Monterey is equally interesting. About one hundred and twenty species of sea weeds have been collected by Mr. Bradley M. Davis, who has charge of the work in botany. These range in size from the giant kelp, which here has a length of thirty or forty feet, down to the minute algæ about the wharves.

The laboratory is well supplied with collecting apparatus, with microscopes, reagents, embedding apparatus, and the usual material for study, this being brought from the labora tories of the Stanford University. About thirty students have been in attendance during the summer, some of these being advanced workers in different departments, some of them teachers and the others students from the laboratories of the university.

Among the pieces of special work which may be noticed are the studies of Professor Frank M. MacFarland on the egg segmentation of the nudibranchs, those of Frank M. Cramer on the nervous system of the limpet, those of Leayerett M. Loomis on the sea birds of Monterey Bay, those of Wilbur W. Thoburn on the rock-fishes, those of Miss Flora Hartley on the anatomy of the abalone, and those of Mr. Charles W. Green on hydroids.

The instruction for the summer has been in the hands of Professors Charles H. Gilbert and Oliver P. Jenkins, of the chairs of zoology and physiology respectively, in the Stanford University, assisted by Bradley M. Davis and Wilbur W. Thoburn, graduate students. The purposes of the laboratory as set forth in the circular are: To supplement the work given in the regular courses of instruction in the zoological, botanical, and physiological departments of the university under the favorable conditions of such a station; to provide facilities for investigators who are prepared to make researches in marine biology, for which the Pacific Coast offers exceptional attractions, in that its field is very rich and is as yet largely unworked, to afford an opportunity to those, especially to teachers, who desire to become acquainted with marine animals and plants, and to learn the practical methods of their study.

In respect to the abundance of material and newness and freshness of the fauna to be studied as well as in the matter

of comfort and convenience of living, there are none of the seaside laboratories which are so fortunately situated as the one at Pacific Grove.

The views from the windows of the laboratory are singu larly picturesque and attractive. On the east is seen the long curve of Monterey Bay, bordered by white sand-dunes covered with deep green chapparal, the dark pine trees of Pacific Grove, and the rocky promontory of Point Alones with its Chinese fishing camp in the foreground, and in the distance the mountains which separate the valley of Monterey from that of San Benito. On the west the irregular coastline is visible as far as the point of pines, and on the north the broad sweep of the bay-shore is in sight as far as the lighthouse of Santa Cruz. The Bay of Monterey, with its surroundings of rock, forest, and mountain, is one of the most picturesque in the world, and to the eye of the naturalist it has no equal, at least short of the coral-lined harbors of the tropics.

THE ANTENNÆ AND STING OF YIKILCAB AS COMPONENTS IN THE MAYA DAY-SIGNS.

BY H. T. CRESSON, AM, M.D.

BEE-CULTURE among the ancient Mayas seems to have received considerable attention, and the apiarists, we are told, had patrons, the Bacabs, one of whom, called Hobnil, was in especial favor. It was in the month Tzoz that the bee keepers began to prepare themselves for their celebration in Tzec, and the four Chacs were at that time presented with plates of incense, one for each Chac, the borders of which were painted around with designs representing the honeycomb.

The species of bee which prepared the celebrated honey of Estabentùm, from a white flower resembling our jessamine, is like the common bee of Europe in shape and size, and differs from it only in having no sting; it is in fact the bee of Yucatan and Chiapas, and the honey which was prepared, especially during the month when the Estabentùm bloomed, was much sought after in early times, and no doubt formed an important article of commerce between the inhabitants of Maiam and the island that is now called Cuba. five other species of bee are said to exist in Yucatan, but, with a few exceptions, their productions are inferior to the bee common to that country and Chiapas.

Four or

That the honey-bee was highly esteemed by the ancient Mayas there is but little doubt; for we see this industrious insect represented in various portions of the Bee Keeper's Narrative" of the Codex Troano, while honey in the comb is represented by the Maya scribe as square cakes of that material (see Fig. 9, plate), carried in the hand of the "god with the old man's face,"- so named to distinguish him from other gods who were represented in the same narrative. Honey is represented by other hieroglyphs, one of which, shown in Fig. 8 of the drawing, has an especial connection with the antennæ sign, and we will presently refer to it. If our alphabet interprets with a reasonable degree of exactitude, we suppose the god with the old man's face to be Kukuitz, who appears in one of his various characters as the patron of the bee-keepers. The phonetic components of the hieroglyph which invariably accompanies this god, sug. gest this interpretation. In front of the glyph we have components of the day-signs Chuen and Akbal enclosed in the dotted aspirate circle, while below it are Landa's aspirates twice, and even in some cases thrice repeated. This gives us "chu-chu" or "khu-khu." Within the glyph, surround

ing the eye, is the scroll which is always present in this god's glyph, and to us suggests the phonetic value of ix or itz. The chi glyph is generally placed underneath what we have assumed to be used as a determinative; the two round glyphs on either side of the tooth-like projections inside of the chi glyph suggest that in this case it is to be used as Chu. I find this chi glyph appearing as chá, chã, chi, cho, chu, a determinative being generally added to suggest which is to be used, whether it be á — ā —i—o—u. An example of one of these supposed determinatives will be given further on in this paper.

The sting of the bee is used in the day-sign yk or ik (see Fig. 7 of drawing), and appears quite frequently in glyph form in the Troano, also in Landa's day-signs and those of the Chilan Balaam of Káua, and is attached to the body of the ahaulil cab, who so frequently appears in the Troauo with body erect as if ready to strike with her stinging apparatus (Fig. 10 of drawing). It can readily be seen that this sting is but a variant of that used in the day-sign ik (Fig. 7. of drawing). It can also be seen attached to the right-hand side of the head-dress of the goddess Cab, second division of plate 25, Codex Troano. The end of the bee's abdomen and the stinging apparatus (Fig. 3. of drawing) is somewhat square like those of the Codex Troano (Bee-Keeper's Narra3

ก

2

tive); but it is easily recognized as a variant of glyphs 7 and 10 of our drawing. The determinative ending is placed just beyond the stinging apparatus, and is composed of the i loop and kil; the dotted aspirate also appears, and the há glyph is the parallel line running out from the il curve- - "ish kil-há" is thus expressed, an admirable suggestion of “ Ikilca" (b is understood).

The antennæ of the bee appear in the day-sign Cauac; in fact the signs yk (or ik). Cauac, and Caban, all have the sting and antennæ of the bee as components. This connection will be more apparent by reference to Dr. D. G. Brinton's study of the "Books of Chilan Balaam," pages 16 and 17. The day-sign 13 Caban, in the Chilan Balaam of Káua, has the antennæ of the bee for its components, and 2 Cauac and 5th ik have the antennæ and sting, one more component appearing in 2d Cauac than in 5th yk. These same signs in the Landa and Troano columns of Brinton's plates have the honey signs, and the antennæ and hive, all used as phonetic components of the glyph, that of Landa and the Codex Troano rendering the word ikilcab with great simplicity. It is expressed thus, "x-il-cab," the dotted sh, or x aspirate, being added to assist the reader in obtaining the correct interpretation. The Cauac glyph also appears in the bas-relief of Kukuitz, the left-hand slab alongside of the doorway, Casa No. 3, Palenque. By placing a lens on a good photograph of this masterpiece of the scribe sculptor's art, the antennæ of the bee can be seen attached to the honey-sign (Fig. 1 of the drawing shows this glyph), the antennæ being at