crystals, are garnet of the variety called spessartine, which, in its pure form, is a little transparent crystal of a pale-yellow color, so that the union of a great number of infinitely small crystals should produce, when regarded ensemble, a yellowish-white tint, which is the prevailing color of the whetstones. Chemical analysis also indicates this manganese garnet, and near the veins of whetstone MM. De Koninck and Davreux discovered beautiful little garnet crystals of spessartine. Another element of the whetstone is schorl, showing under the microscope as minute parallelograms, pale green, blue, or grayish, and dicroscopic; also a prismatic mineral allied to chrysoberyl, and only discernible with high powers. It appears as prisms of a greenish-yellow color, scattered throughout the whetstone sporadically, sometimes ranged in lines, often interlacing and superposed, but maintaining a position the while too regular and constant in its repetition not to be subject to some crystallographic law, the simplest form being geniculated twins, with an angle of 60°. The author concludes, from his examination and microscopical study of this rare rock of Salm and the neighborhood, that the whetstone bands are real layers in the Cambrian formation, deposited in the same way as the adjoining slates, and only metamorphosed in a general way, the mineralogical elements being present from the very beginning of the deposit.

In the July number of the Monthly Microscopical Journal is a graceful tribute to Ehrenberg by T. Rupert Jones, who, though finding it impossible to accept most of Ehrenberg's specific, and even generic, determinations, states that the better his work is elucidated and understood, the more will his beautiful and lasting illustrations and his painstaking synoptical registers advance the progress of biology in relation to both the present and the past.

After a careful comparison of all Ehrenberg's figures of fossil Foraminifera, Professors W. K. Parker and T. Rupert Jones have stated in the Ann. and Mag. Nat. Hist., series 4, vol. ix., p. 216, etc., that, besides twenty undetermined forms, 138 species and noticeable varieties are shown in the "Mikrogeologie," most of which are living at the present day, and eightyone of which had been named by other observers. Since the publication of the "Mikrogeologie," two noble memoirs have been published by Ehrenberg, the first in 1872, being the

results of his long-continued methodical researches on the microscopic life of the sea-bottom of all zones, illustrated by twelve beautiful plates. The second, in 1874, is a résumé of the marine microscopic fossils, treated of in the Monatsberichte and Abhandlungen of the Berlin Academy, and in the "Mikrogeologie." Also an account of the Polycystine formations of Barbadoes and of the Nicobar Islands, illustrated by thirty quarto plates. Following these are remarks on the chalk marble of Antrim and white marl of Lubin, with notes on the fresh-water and volcanic materials yielding Diatomace, on the economic use of microscopic organisms, and on the systematic classification of Polycystina. To few has it been given to gather together before death their gleanings of knowledge, industriously sought for during the midday of working life, and to harvest their sheaves in such noble vol

umes.

Dr. Cohen, of Heidelberg, finds that the specks in the Cape diamonds are sometimes due to crystals of specular iron, the larger faces of which lie parallel to the octahedral face of the diamond. ·

Dr. Leidy, at a recent meeting of the Philadelphia Academy, stated that the examination of the cut opals from the Querétaro mines, Mexico, shows the brilliant display of colors to be due to reflection from facets one quarter to one millimeter in breadth of irregular polyhedral forms, a sort of mosaic pavement on a basis of amorphous opal, but which are distinctly parallel striate, the striæ changing in direction on the different facets, so that the whole consists of an aggregation of particles, of a striated or finely tubular structure, imbedded in a basis of more amorphous opal, and in polished sections emitting the varied hues for which the precious opal is so much admired, according to the varying fineness of the striæ and their inclination.

ANTHROPOLOGY.

By Professor OTIS T. MASON,

COLUMBIAN UNIVERSITY, WASHINGTON, D. C.

The definition of a science so comprehensive and so dependent as anthropology must be for a long time provisional. Yet those who are conversant with the progress of this department of knowledge cannot have failed to observe, from year to year, a marked improvement in this regard. The following definitions by distinguished anthropologists will indicate the area of the science as now generally understood. "Anthropology," says De Quatrefages, "is the natural history of man, studied monographically, as a zoologist studies an animal.” M. Broca defines it to be "the science which studies the human race in its entirety, in its details, and in its relation to the rest of nature." Dr. Topinard considers anthropology to be "that branch of natural history which treats of man and the races of men."

Still less accurately defined are the subdivisions of the subject; but the analysis best suited to a summary of progress is that which brings together the results of the labors of specialists. As in every scientific inquiry there is a descriptive and a deductive phase, in the study of anthropology each assemblage of facts calls forth discussions as to their bearing upon each other, and upon the science at large. It will be impossible to separate these in the summary, inasmuch as the two usually coexist in the same treatise.

The races to be considered are extinct or extant. The study of extinct races, or archæology, is usually the pursuit of a separate class of scholars. This branch of anthropology will therefore claim our attention first. The investigation of extant races is subdivided for the convenience of specialists, as in the course of lectures delivered in Paris during the last winter under the auspices of the Société d'Anthropologie. The notes in this summary will be arranged somewhat on the same plan, as follows:

1. Anthropotomy, including the comparative anatomy of man and of the lower animals; called also anatomical anthropology.

2. Biological Anthropology, comprehending somatology and comparative psychology, the former embracing comparative physiology and external racial or tribal characteristics.

3. Ethnical Anthropology, in which are grouped ethnography, or the description of tribes and peoples; ethnology, or discussions concerning the races of men; and demography, or the application of statistics to anthropological investigations. 4. Linguistic Anthropology and Comparative Philology. 5. Cultural Anthropology, or comparative culture, including the treatment of the following subjects: food; dwelling and other domestic structures, and their appurtenances; vessels and household utensils; dress and ornament; implements of war and the chase; implements of industry; means of locomotion; methods of measuring and valuing; æsthetic culture in music, pastime, and art; the family; the community; the government; and religion.

6. Anthropological Instrumenta, embracing terminology, apparatus of research, instructions to observers, records of meetings, courses of instruction and lectures, transactions of societies, expositions and congresses, museums, periodicals and published works.

In order to render the references the more accessible, they are arranged, where convenient, under the following geographical divisions: North America, Middle America, South America, Europe, Africa, Asia, Malaysia, Australasia, Polynesia.

ARCHEOLOGY.

NORTH AMERICA.

Several papers were read before the Congress of Americanists at Luxembourg on the antiquities of Greenland and the primitive habitat of the Eskimos. In the first volume of Powell's "Contributions to American Ethnology" is an elaborate communication, by Mr. Wm. H. Dall, upon Succession in the Shell-heaps of Alaska. The report of F. W. Putnam, the curator of the Peabody Museum, upon his labors during the year is given in the tenth annual report. The following papers upon North American archæology have ap

peared during the year: An Ancient Implement of Wood from near East Windsor, Conn., E. W. Ellsworth, Smithsonian Rep., 1876; the Dighton Rock Inscription, Charles Race, American Anthropological Association; Palæolithic Implements with reference to Eskimo Occupation of North America, Mr. Berlin, same meeting; the Discovery of Supposed Palæolithic Implements in the Glacial Drift of the Delaware River, C. C. Abbott, Peabody Museum Rep. X.; Exploration of a Mound in Lee County, Va., Lucien Carr, Peabody Museum Rep. X.; Ancient Mica - quarrying in North Carolina, C. D. Smith, Smithsonian Rep., 1876 (some of the blocks. detached by the aborigines have sold as high as $200); on Prehistoric Remains in Western North Carolina, Alexis A. Julian, paper before the Academy of Natural Sciences, New York; the Shell-mounds of Florida, F. D. Lente, M.D., in Semi-Tropical for March and April (the same subject was discussed by Isaiah Gregor before the State Archæological Association, Ohio, and by A. Ecker in Archiv für Anthropologie, parts i., ii.); Cranial Perforations by the Ancient Moundbuilders, Henry Gillman, American Association. Papers on the Antiquities of Wisconsin were read before the State Historical Society (in Vol. III. of the Proceedings, we have the Ancient Civilization of America, W. L. P. Nicodemus; Report of Committee on Exploration of Mounds near Madison; Copper Tools found within the State of Wisconsin, Professor J. D. Butler. A pamphlet on Prehistoric Wisconsin, illustrated with heliotype plates, has been published by the same author); on Wisconsin Mounds, Moses Strong, Smithsonian Rep., 1876. The Davenport Academy of Natural Science has issued Vol. II., Part I., of Proceedings, containing, among other important papers, an illustrated account of Inscribed Tablets found by Rev. J. Gass, and discussions about their authenticity and value, by Dr. Farquharson (the society has erected a building for its meetings and collections). Further papers on the same subject are, Explorations in Southeastern Ohio, Professor B. Andrews, Peabody Museum Rep. X.; Sculptured Rocks and Cup-markings in Ohio and Kentucky, Dr. Daniel Wilson, Toronto, pamphlet; Recent Archæological Discoveries in the American Bottom, Ill., by Henry R. Howland, Bulletin of the Buffalo Society of Natural Science, March 2; on the Moundbuilders of Illinois, Western Review, Nov.; on the Rockfort