Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 34.djvu/709

Rh as related to the Aztecs; in fact, he had often found among them the peculiar, dreamy, melancholy facial expression which is ascribed to the ancient Mexicans. In the light of the later researches, Colombia, the country of the Chibchas, the third most important people in pre-Columbian America, obtains a special significance, because it was the region which at the time of the discovery prevented contact between Mexican and Peruvian civilizations. The speaker produced linguistic evidence that the Chibchas, who were resident in the heart of Colombia, were not an immemorially isolated people in the sense in which they had formed one of the puzzles of the New World. They had near relatives in the people of Costa Rica and northern Colombia. People of Chibcha and Mexican origin met in Costa Rica. According to these evidences the dispersion of the Chibcha people may be historically conceived by assuming that originally dwelling near Cundinamarca, they afterward spread out, and were still later scattered by the influx of wild Brazilian tribes and driven to the mountains, where they lost their connections. A paper was also presented by Herr Uhle on the primitive history and wanderings of the Chibchas.

Other papers were read by Messrs. Borsari, on the constructions of the ancient Peruvians; Müller, on the Sambakis of Brazil, a people who had a prehistoric civilization; Von den Steinen, on his second journey to the Xingu, in which certain conclusions, particularly those respecting the relationship of the Tupi and the Caribs, which he had formed in his former journey, were confirmed; and on the Calendar-stone and various antiquities, statuettes, and potteries of Mexico and Central America. M. Hamy made some remarks at the close of the meeting on the falsification of American antiquities, which had reached a great height, and exhibited an album containing specimens of the counterfeits.—Translated for the Popular Science Monthly from Humboldt.

importance of educating youth for the duties of citizenship is made more obvious at every general election. As indicated by Prof. Woodward, of St. Louis, some months ago, a course of civics in the public schools should embrace an analysis of our scheme of government, national, State, and municipal, with a general statement of the functions of each; the necessary expenses of each of the governments, with a detail of the institutions that must be supported by taxation; the methods in use of levying and collecting taxes; and the duties of citizenship—such as the maintenance of individual independence; the contribution of one's share in taxes to the necessary expenses of government; participation in all measures necessary to secure the selection of faithful and competent servants to discharge the duties of government; the cultivation of a proper public opinion in favor of honesty, temperance, and the refinements of civilized life; and the contribution of something, small or great, to the common weal, beyond the duties specially named, whereby the world may be the better for one's having lived in it.