many young visitors, who came and observed the fishes critically as a result of their first experiments in aquarium keeping; on the other hand, there were professional zoölogists who came to see some of the fishes alive which they had known only on the shelves of museums.

The aquaria were nearly a hundred in number, mainly small ones, balanced (still water), attractively displayed, showing besides fishes, rare aquatic vegetation and a number of curious invertebrates. Popular exhibits there were, of course, in number: gold fishes of many forms "fantails," "telescopes," "comets," "fringetails," some admirable specimens both Chinese and Japanese, including some of the variety which is short and heavy of body and blunt of tail, especially prized by the Japanese fanciers. Then there were paradise fish (Macropodus) of all sizes, which is sib to the famous gourami, the most delicately flavored of all East Indian food fishes, as well as to the Bengalese Trichogaster common in the Calcutta market - here also shown living.

But the feature of the exhibition was the number and interest of the exotic forms represented, creatures which one is apt to know only from pictures in textbooks. Thus there was the water butterfly, Pantodon (African), said to be a "flying fish," although judging from the habits of the fish in the aquarium, the stroke of its filmy tail does not allow it to spring far out of water. There was Mastacembelus, an Indian "eel" which is not an eel. There was an Indian Ophiocephalus which can live beneath sun-baked mud and which under ordinary conditions breathes partly by means of a "lung," and resembles outwardly the American ganoid Amia, which, by the way, is also more or less of an air breather. There were several genera of cichlids, perchlike fishes, tropical American, and of characinids which replace the tribe of carps in Africa and South America, and include the most formidable fresh water fishes in the world. tropical catfishes which are rarely seen out of their native waters, among them Macrones (East Indian) with bright bands of color and exaggerated "feelers," also a South American Dorad, its body half covered with armor, and its fully armored cousin, Callichthys, which is probably the most eccentric of all catfishes. There were forms whose habits of reproduction are extraordinary, like Gambusia, Girardina, Pacilia, which bear living young, and were exhibited beside their youngsters. Finally, there was not lacking the pla-kat, or Malayan fighting fish, Betta pugnax, a veritable aquatic game-cock reared for shows of fish-fighting which in Siam draw throngs of spectators.

There were

Especial credit in bringing together many of these exotic and rare forms is due to Mr. Isaac Buchanan, an amateur who devotes much time to the study of aquarial fishes, and it was similar interests which led Mr. Richard Dorn, president of the society, to organize the present display. The society

itself is made up mainly of amateurs; it includes nearly a hundred members, a number of whom are German-Americans who have brought over the sea their love of this form of nature study; for in Germany the aquarium societies are old and widely-spread institutions, attracting and training many naturalists. The present society may even be regarded as a filiale of the widespread German organization "Triton."

The present exhibition.

demonstrates again, and in

East Indian catfish (Macrones), bright colored and with long feelers

an attractive way, the value of keeping an aquarium, not as a hobby merely, but also as a means of studying the habits and development of many aquatic

forms which would otherwise

be inaccessible to naturalists.

It even puts within range of its owner some of the large questions which these forms. illustrate, as for example the variation of aquatic animals and plants under artificial conditions, and the way in which these variations are passed on to the young, questions which lead far into the field of Darwinism. Nor can we leave out of account the experimental value of the aquarium, in testing how fishes can be reared, and what are the best conditions for breeding them, questions which touch practical fisheries. The success of the present exhibition leads one to hope that similar displays will be held annually.

A POWER IN APPEALS FOR LIFE. OPENED ONLY IN SACRED CEREMONIAL FOR THE FULFILLMENT OF A WOMAN'S VOW

A

By Clark Wissler

MONG the exhibits for the Plains Indians may be found the bundle

for the medicine woman in the Blackfoot sun dance, a simple outfit far more sacred than even the medicine pipe. The chief object is a headdress built on a strip of rawhide in the form of a lizard. On the headdress in front is what is spoken of as a doll, which contains a prairie. turnip. All this together with certain paints is kept in a cylindrical rawhide case, in fact is never taken out except when the appropriate ritual is performed. Attached to the case is a digging stick, woman's primitive tool and with these Indians the symbol of her fall.

As their old sacred story runs, a virgin loved the morning star and was carried by him to the home of his heavenly parents, the sun and moon, where she took up the domestic duties of a wife. As on earth, she gathered roots for the table with her digging stick, but one large fine prairie turnip she was forbidden to dig up. Now like the woman of our own sacred story, she yielded to curiosity and thrust her stick under the turnip. Sorrow and grief for her people below were now her portion and she was banished to earth, but directed to teach the lesson and confer a medicine bundle on her descendants. Since the bundle came from the house of the sun, it symbolizes much of his power and might.

This medicine bundle finds its chief function in the fulfillment of a vow a woman's vow. If a dear one is near unto death, a woman may stand before the sun and say, "Hear me, I am virtuous, I have been true to my marriage bond; if our dear one is spared, I will open the bundle at the sun dance." A medicine man is usually called to take formal note of the vow and to direct the unhappy one. Now the sun is not deceived and if an unworthy woman so address him, retribution is certain. Further, this woman must at the next sun dance make public confession of all temptations she has experienced. Yet more, this public confession is also a challenge and it is the duty of every bystander to impeach her, if there is aught to impeach.

Following the vow are months of preparation. At the time of the sun dance the woman fasts four days and on the last day the bundle is opened, the headdress placed on her brow and the digging stick on her back. The ritual is long, requiring most of the day for its many songs and prayers. In one place a solemn medicine man while dancing with the stick rehearses

the digging of that first forbidden turnip. At last the woman is conducted to the sun dance place where her confession is made. The bundle she cares for until some other woman makes a vow.

The whole tribe has an interest in this ceremony. They camp in a great circle and await the issue of

those four days, for should there be a fault, all would suffer. The appearance of the woman with this regalia is the great ceremonial moment of the tribe, all are there to see and stand in reverent silence.

That the bundle is here is due to our late friend The Bear-One. One day we received a letter in which he stated that the

bundle owned by a certain woman could be had for the cost of a few presents to her family. We learned later that the husband of the bundle-owner had died. During his illness the woman prayed to the bundle and made a vow to the sun. Now if such a plea is of no avail, the woman is released from her obligation, but more, she is then under the displeasure of the sun and should get clear of the bundle. Because of the disrepute this bundle was now in, no one would care to take it and the poor widow looked upon it as the real cause of her husband's death. The reader must know that the taking of a bundle is like entering into marriage, one cannot escape the bonds without scandal and crime, except in the regular manner. Even one so powerful as our friend could not have ventured to give us such a bundle under normal conditions; as it was, the risk was great. Misfortune and sudden death were predicted for him; in fact his end recently, some two years after the events of this story, was regarded as proof of the sun's displeasure.

The

Through a mistaken transference of captions on page 299 of the December JOURNAL, the discovery of the Blackfoot sun dance was accredited to Dr. Pliny E. Goddard. investigations of Dr. Goddard concerned the sun dance of the Plains Cree.

Building the frame of wil

lows

Procession

of holy men in sun-wise direction

Entering for the purification rites

THE MUSEUM'S COLLECTION OF LIFE CASTS

WITH PHOTOGRAPHS ILLUSTRATING THE METHOD OF MAKING DUPLICATE CASTS FOR EXCHANGE WITH OTHER INSTITUTIONS

Τ

HE origin of the primitive races of the New World and their possible relations to the geographically isolated races of the Old World is

one of the most interesting questions of ethnological research, which if it ever comes to anything must needs reach its results through comparative study of the races themselves in their physical types and their cultures. In this country especial interest has attached to study of the Indian tribes of the northwest coast of North America for comparison with northern Asiatic tribes, with a view to establishing proofs of the derivation of the western tribes from the eastern, or at least of a mingling of the two

Model of a head of which duplicate casts are desired. The model is covered with a half-inch thickness of clay [a small part of the clay is cut away to show the face of the model underneath] and a two-piece plaster mold is made over the clay. When the plaster has hardened, the mold is taken off, and the clay is removed from the model