MUSEUM NOTES

SINCE the last issue of the JOURNAL the following persons have been elected to membership in the Museum:

Life Members, MRS. W. BAYARD CUTTING, MRS. A. D. JUILLIARD, MISS CHARLOTTE S. BAKER and MESSRS. CARL E. AKELEY, BERNARD M. BARUCH, C. WILLIAM BEEBE, Louis V. BELL, W. R. CALLENDER, Hugh L. Cooper, Marcus Daly, N. W. HARRIS, HENRY C. PHipps, Robert J. F. SCHWARZENBACH, HERMAN SIMON and MASTER H. MARTYN BAKER;

Sustaining Members, MESSRS. HORACE HAVEMEYER and ROBERT MAX

WELL;

Annual Members, MRS. E. S. AUCHINCLOSS, MRS. BIRDSEYE BLAKEMAN, MRS. CHARLES A. DAVISON, MRS. WILLIAM P. DRAPER, MRS. SARAH H. EMERSON, MRS. FRANK D. HARMON, MRS. HALSTEAD PELL HODSON, MRS. EDWIN B. HOLDEN, MRS. THOMAS A. HOWELL, MRS. R. P. HUNTINGTON, MRS. MINOR C. KEITH, MRS. JAMES GAMBLE ROGERS, MRS. JAMES R. SHEFFIELD, MISS EMILY VERNON CLARK, MISS ALICE BLEECKER FOox, MISS MARION ERSKINE PLATT, MISS B. G. STILLMAN, MISS ELIZABETH B. STONE, MISS MARIA WILLETS, and MESSRS. JOHN ACHELIS, LOUIS AKIN, WILLIAM C. BEECHER, CLARENCE H. BISSELL, GRAHAM F. BLANDY, B. BLUMENTHAL, A. HUIDEKOPER BOND, E. H. BRIGHT, IRVING SWAN BROWN, J. ALEXANDER BROWN, THOMAS A. BUCKNER, FREDERICK V. CLOWES, FREDERIC A. COLE, ROBERT H. COOK, CLARKSON COWL, EDWIN WILLARD DEMING, CHAS. DICKINSON, WILLIAM C. DUVALL, FREDERICK H. EATON, MILTON S. ERLANGER, WILLIAM L. FEENEY, ELIAS J. FEUERSTEIN, EDWARD B. FINCH, RICHARD H. FRAENCKEL, ÅLBERT GALLATIN, E. V. GAMBIER, SAMUEL W. GOLDBERG, FREDERICK GOLDSMITH, MORRIS GOLDZIER, RAMON GUITERAS, HENRY L. GWALTER, DANIEL S. HAGE, WILLIAM A. HAMANN, JOHN G. HANNAH, THOMAS HASTINGS, F. C. HAVEMEYER, MAX HELD, WILLIAM H. HELLER, MAX HERMAN, W. W. HEROY, JAMES S. HIGBIE, HOWARD P. HOMANS, C. S. HOMER, FORD HUNTINGTON, WILLIAM JAY IVES, JAMES W. JACKSON, ALFRED W. JENKINS, PATRICK KIERNAN, EDWARD J. KNAPP, JOSEPH P. KNAPP, LOUIS KROWER, W. V. LAWRENCE, CHARLES M. LEA, R. WALTER LEIGH, GEORGE LUEDERS, DAVID L. LUKE, ALBERT G. MILBANK, GEORGE A. MOLLESON, JAMES G. NEWCOMB, EDWARD D. PAGE, ARCHER VANCE PANCOAST, EDGERTON PARSONS, RAYMOND C. PENFIELD, G. LAWRENCE PERKINS, AUGUSTE RUFFIN POTTIER, WILLIAM J. QUINLAN, JR., GEORGE I. ROBERTS, J. E. ROTH, WILLIAM L. ROUSE, OTTO M. SCHWERDTFEGER, DUDLEY D. SICHER, JAMES C. SMILLIE, RALPH SMILLIE, THEODORE E. SMITH, CARL STOECKEL, HAROLD PHELPS STOKES, GEORGE C. STONE, I. F. STONE, GEORGE H. STORM, EMIL L. STROBEL, CHARLES TATNAM, ALVIN UNTERMYER, OTTOMAR H. VAN NORDEN, ARTHUR WILLIAMS, JAMES V. S. WOOLLEY,

THE skins and skeletons of two Prjevalsky wild horses have been presented by the Duke of Bedford to the American Museum, and one of them has just been received and is now being prepared for mounting. The Prjevalsky horse is the only living wild species of the true horse (as distinct from the asses and zebras). Inhabiting the most remote parts of Central Asia, its existence has been doubted until recent years, and of the specimens sent to Europe and this country, several have been merely Mongolian ponies run wild or hybrid stock. The little herd in the Duke of Bedford's park at Woburn Abbey however represents the true strain of the wild species, the last survivor in nature of the numerous wild horses which inhabited the northern world in prehistoric times.

A PUBLIC READING-ROOM has been established on the second floor not far from the elevator, where visitors will find many volumes bearing upon the collections and work of the Museum. These books include a number of the more general or popular works on natural history, dealing with the haunts and habits of many of the animals, and also books of travel or those telling of the habits of the more savage races, their myths, traditions and customs, or describing what is known of the history of the earlier inhabitants of this country.

THE LIBRARY of the Museum, which is one of the most complete of its kind in this country, is also freely open to visitors, who may consult its many volumes and periodicals. The reading-room is by no means intended to take the place of the library, but rather to lead up to it, and its aim is promptly and readily to furnish general information to visitors who may wish to know more about the collections than can be gathered from the labels and the objects themselves.

MR. CARL E. AKELEY and MR. C. WILLIAM BEEBE were elected life members of the Museum at the meeting of the Executive Committee on January 17, the former in recognition of his explorations and zoological studies in Africa and for his contributions to science, the latter in recognition of his scientific work and his gift to the Museum of a collection of mammals from the East Indies.

AT the annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association Dr. Robert H. Lowie was elected associate editor of the American Anthropologist, and editor of a new quarterly to be devoted to current anthropological literature.

PROF. C.-E. A. WINSLOW was elected Vice-President of the Society of American Bacteriologists at its meeting in Washington during conven

THE Executive Committee, at its meeting of January 17, appointed Mr. Charles W. Mead assistant curator in the department of anthropology, the appointment to take effect January 1, 1912.

Two volumes (XXIX and XXX) of the Museum Bulletin were published during the year 1911. Volume XXIX is devoted to a single subject, "A Synonymic Index Catalogue of American Spiders" by Dr. Alexander Petrunkevitch, honorary curator of Arachnida in the American Museum. The work comprises all the species known to inhabit the two American continents and their adjacent islands, from Greenland to Patagonia. It forms a volume of nearly 800 pages, and consists of three parts (1) Bibliography, (2) List of species with synonyms and reference, (3) Alphabetic index to synonyms. Types are designated for the genera, and the localities are given from which the species have been recorded. It is thus an indispensable reference book for all arachnologists.

Volume XXX contains about 400 pages, 17 plates, and about 150 text figures, and gives some of the results of the work of the scientific staff for the year. Among the sixteen papers, one of much general interest by Colonel Theodore Roosevelt, on "Revealing and Concealing Coloration in Birds and Mammals," has been noticed in an earlier number of the JOURNAL (Vol. XI, Oct., 1911, p. 200).

IN 1908 the department of anthropology sent an expedition to James Bay, Canada, in charge of Mr. Alanson Skinner, to study the Eastern Cree Indians. The party went in by the Missinaibi River. The next year the party made a second journey, this time down the Albany River. The total distance traveled by canoe and on foot was some twenty-four hundred miles. The scientific results of these journeys have just appeared.1 While hardships made a complete investigation impossible, this paper gives nevertheless descriptive data on almost every phase of the Cree and Saulteaux culture. The information on food habits and hunting customs is satisfactory and the collection of Cree tales and myths indicates clearly their tribal relationships. The author believes that the Cree have a culture intermediate between that of the Eskimo on the north and the Woodland Indians on the south, best designated perhaps by the term sub-arctic. Particularly interesting are the notes on the use of grooved stone axes, stone knives, and other primitive tools till recently in occasional use. It is often necessary to remind the general reader that the Stone Age was but a condition and not an absolute period. Another interesting point is full data upon typical bear-hunting ceremonies among the Saulteaux, a feature so far not adequately described. Also a unique and almost extinct type of basket weave was found.

1 NOTES ON THE EASTERN CREE AND NORTHERN SAULTEAUX, By Alanson Skinner. pp. 178, plates 2, figs. 57, Anthropological Papers, A. M. N. H., Part I, Vol. IX.

A NEW rattlesnake group to illustrate social instinct in hibernation was put on exhibition during January. Seven banded or timber rattlers (Crotalus horridus) in both the black and yellow phases of coloration are represented on a rocky ledge, the poses depicting slow movement on a cool day and in the absence of enemies. Late in the fall under the influence of increasing cold, snakes which have assembled thus in September crawl away through deep crevices into concealed chambers underneath the rocks, where they sleep together throughout the winter. The group shows also color variation in two of the small broods of young banded rattlers. This species is the only poisonous snake besides the copperhead in the eastern United States.

THE department of anthropology was recently visited by Dr. Werner von Hoerschelmann on his return from Mexico, where he has been at work for over a year under the direction of Professor Seler, as holder of a scholarship granted by the Prussian government. Dr. von Hoerschelmann is especially interested in the subject of art and discovered many points of interest in the Museum's collection of Mexican antiquities.

THE Indian tipi in the new Plains Indian Hall has been mounted by Mr. Schoichi Ichikawa. The floor has been carefully laid with buffalo grass sod supplied by Dr. James R. Walker, Pine Ridge, South Dakota, so that the visitor may see, as it were, the home of the roving Indian pitched for the night upon the brown unbroken turf of the Plains as in the good old buffalo days. The tipi came from the Blackfoot tribe. Within may be seen the life cast of a Blackfoot man in the act of preparing tobacco for the pipe. Near him his younger wife is stirring up the fire, while opposite her is the older wife with an infant. The latter has her face liberally coated with earth paint as was the custom among those of her station in life. Back of the fire is an incense altar upon which daily prayer offerings are burnt and from which may be seen rising a faint column of smoke

THE MUSEUM has received a number of bottlenose porpoises Tursiops tursio as a gift from the New York Zoological Society. For many years a fishery has been in operation at Cape Hatteras, where porpoises are taken for the sake of their oil and also for their hides, though how the tender porpoise skin can be tanned into tough leather is one of the mys teries of modern science. Dr Charles H. Townsend of the aquarium has for some time wished to secure specimens from this locality, a project requiring a combination of favorable circumstances. The porpoises must be feeding near shore, which they do at certain seasons and not at others, else being caught in nets they would be drowned before brought to land, the sea must not be heavy or the same unfortunate result ensues, to ay nothing of the danger of taking boats through the surf, also the weather must be neither

too hot nor too cold, because of danger of the animals dying in transit. Dr. Townsend devised an ingenious method by which the porpoises would travel comfortably and be left free to breathe, and dispatched an assistant to Cape Hatteras. After considerable work and delay half a dozen fairsized examples were selected, packed, and started on their way to New York, only to be killed by the sudden settling down over the east of recordbreaking cold.

MR. EDWARD PAUL, chief of the Penobscot Indians, Old Town, Me., called at the Museum in January to see the Eastern Woodland collections and especially those of his own people. Mr. Paul is an educated man. He says that notwithstanding the fact that his people outwardly conform to our mode of life, they at home preserve many aboriginal traits and customs. He thinks that this is chiefly due to the fact that his tribe still owns the island home of its ancestors, whose shores are seldom visited by white people. The Indian men work for the whites but each evening come back to the island, where they are isolated completely. Mr. Paul volunteered to assist in arranging the Penobscot section of the new Eastern Woodland Indian hall.

DR. EDWARD A. SAPIR, director of the anthropological survey of Canada, and H. Barbeau, a member of his staff, recently spent a few days at the Museum studying the anthropological collections.

DURING the fall months, Messrs. Allen and Miller, who with two native assistants now form the Colombian expedition, worked in the Central Andes, along the Quindio trail and on the paramo of Santa Isabel. In a letter dated Cartago, November 16, Mr. Miller states that sixteen hundred specimens of birds and mammals had already been secured, and that the expedition was then about to penetrate the little-known coast range to the westward. Here only foot-trails exist and all supplies will therefore have to be transported on the backs of men.

FIELD work in Florida carried on during November by Messrs. F. E. Lutz and C. W. Leng in company with Mr. W. T. Davis, was primarily for the purpose of obtaining information which would facilitate future work in what is an easily accessible subtropical region almost unexplored biologically. The party covered about fifteen hundred miles, incidentally collecting more than five thousand specimens which will give new records as to either date or locality or both for one thousand species. The fauna of Florida is of especial interest to the department of invertebrate zoology in its bearing upon problems of distribution, for Florida is the last step in the journey of such species as may have come to the United States by way of the West