Complete carapace of the new glyptodont Brachyostracon, four feet eight inches long, three feet one inch high

of half a dozen American families. Thus there was a ride to and from the specimen, which consumed several hours each day, but the changing rural scenes more than compensated for the loss of time. Every mile was through scenes primitive as in Bible times. It is difficult to realize that within four days' travel from New York, people are using the methods of soil culture employed two thousand years ago. In the valley, whiteclad men cultivated the fields with wood pointed plows drawn by oxen, or planted sugar cane, while on the hills and high above on the mountain sides others worked in the fields of century plants from which tequile, the native alcoholic drink, is brewed.

The peon field hand is a picturesque figure in his white cotton shirt and trousers, with a straw sombrero and fibre sandals. A bright red blanket over his shoulder serves as a coat when the air is chill, and at night is his bed. In the early hours of the day groups of blanketed figures shuffle along the road to and from town, some carrying immense loads on their heads or backs. But the burro is the common carrier of the mountainous districts. What the camel is to desert Africa, the burro is to Mexico. Caravans file over the mountain trails loaded with bales, boxes and lumber. At first sight it is rather disconcerting to see a stack of hay or a shock of corn moving along the road apparently of its own volition. Closer scrutiny however reveals four tiny feet underneath, sufficient evidence that a burro is the motive power.

Partly dug-out glyptodont carapace in a region of terraced Pleistocene gravel beds

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often the

scattered along the streams and at springs. On wash days the women congregate along the streams, washing the clothes on flat stones same stones on which they grind their daily corn.

Having had fossils injured by curious natives in northern Mexico, I feared that harm might come to this valuable specimen if found by them, so exercised considerable care to ride to it unobserved until it should be

In the valleys white-clad men cultivate the fields with wood pointed plows drawn by oxen

What the camel is to desert Africa, the burro is to Mexico

completely prepared for transportation. When ready for shipment it weighed over four hundred pounds. The work of carrying the fossil to Ameca proved a considerable problem. An oxcart, because of its uncertainty was not to be considered, therefore the mail-carrier of the town was persuaded to transport the fossil in his wagon - that is, from the point where the road began. From the bad lands down to this road eight peons carried the specimen suspended from a pole, making a picturesque group, as are all seen along Mexican roads. Before this discovery there were in existence two glyptodont carapaces from the valley of Mexico, both preserved in Mexico City. They with this third specimen from Ameca show characters in the teeth, pelvis and carapace that distinguish the

Mexican glyptodonts from known South American genera. On account of the peculiar shape of the carapace, which is short and high, this genus has been named Brachyostracon.

EARLY MAN IN AMERICA

THIRTY YEARS OF EXPERIENCE IN SEARCHING FOR EVIDENCES OF THE ANTIQUITY OF MAN IN THE DELAWARE VALLEY

F

By Ernest Volk

1

OR the last half-century the question of man's antiquity in America has kept the scientific world busy. In the first place the pioneers

of prehistoric archæology made very important finds in England and France in the shape of artificially fractured flints. These were found in glacial gravel and upon claiming them as the handiwork of man, the discoverers were vigorously assailed as to their veracity. Gradually however, evidence of such overpowering weight accumulated that it finally triumphed over criticism.

Exactly the same unpleasant experience was in store for archæologists in America, but fortunately in this as elsewhere in life, patience and perseverance are valuable capital. It is this capital that has drawn a large interest in the search for traces of early man in the Delaware Valley, where indeed unlimited patience was needed, day in and day out during weeks and months barren of result. Thousands of feet of earth, sand and gravel were removed with the trowel and carefully searched for specimens. Each day's work was begun with a new hope, which lived only to be buried at evening and resurrected again each following morning. Thus the archæologist becomes a veritable "Micawber," always hoping "for something to turn up."

Thirty years of a man's life seem a long time to look for a certain thing, but when a subject becomes so well established that it fills his mind, years fly like days. The last twenty-two of my thirty years' search were under the direction of Professor F. W. Putnam of Harvard University, who with untiring interest and love for the work has always succeeded in soliciting new funds for the explorations which have finally brought results.

The glacial deposits are a very prominent feature at Trenton, the city actually being built upon the glacial drift which forms a bank of from forty to sixty feet high near the Delaware, extending southeast and then south for miles until finally lost. Of these deposits the Trenton gravel has a thickness of thirty to forty feet near the river and gradually thins out as it extends eastward. It is composed of coarse and fine sand and gravel. with large boulders both water-worn and angular, varying from six to forty

Editor's note.- THE ARCHEOLOGY OF THE DELAWARE VALLEY. By Ernest Volk. 8vo., pp. 258, plate 127. Published by the Peabody Museum, Harvard University, 1911. Mr. Ernest Volk, field archæologist, has published in this volume with fascinating detail and clearness many notes from his field journal. These together with his conclusions are of exceedingly great interest not only to the technically trained archæologist but also to the average reader interested in the history of the human race in America.

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and more inches in diameter. The whole is stratified and shows in addition to the large boulders, a peculiar feature much like a pit but which, from my point of view, cannot be mistaken for an ordinary pit, being rather an ice pit, a place once occupied by a large cake of ice. This ice stranded there and melting gradually, the while the stratum overlying it was being laid down, finally disappeared altogether, and its place was taken up by material from said stratum above. All ice pits found have been near the top in the last layer of sand. The deposit of the Trenton gravel is topped by a yellow loam, varying in thickness from two to five feet and is a combination of loam, fine sand, clay and iron. On top of this yellow loam is the so-called black soil, the surface at the present day. This is chiefly the accumulation of decayed vegetation and varies in thickness from six to thirty-six and more inches according to the adaptability of the location to plant growth.

The long search on this glacial terrace has brought traces of the presence of early man, of which the black or top soil shows the following evidence: numerous force-broken quartzite pebbles, chips and flakes of various minerals such as argillite, chert, hornstone, jasper, quartz and quartzite, detached in the manufacture of implements; also the implements themselves, whole and broken, and occasionally fragments of animal bone and small fragments of pottery. This black soil has been disturbed by human agency and penetrated downward into the underlying yellow loam in pits, postholes, ashbeds, hearths and graves.

The pits are of various depths from one to five feet and of a diameter from six to sixty inches and contain charcoal, broken pottery, fragments of animal bone, whole and broken implements, plant and fruit remains, nutshells and whole and broken pebbles, of which many are burnt and firefractured. The hearths contain single and double layers of pebbles, whole, burnt and fire-broken. The ashbeds are generally the depth of the shallow pits and contain a large amount of ashes with fragments of animal bone among which are recognized the bones of Virginia deer, of bear, wolf or fox, beaver and opossum, wild turkey, wild goose or duck, of the sturgeon, shad, catfish and turtle. These ashpits are clearly the evidences of large feasts.

The graves were of three kinds according to depth. The shallow graves were those where the body had evidently been laid upon the surface and the ground or earth heaped over it forming a low mound which has generally been disturbed by the farmer's plow. The medium graves had a depth of from eight to twenty inches below the surface and the deep graves from two to three feet. The skeletons found show that bodies were buried in various positions, on the side with knees drawn up toward the body prevailing. In some instances the body was straightened out on the back with arms at the side. In one exceptional case the body had been placed in a sitting