Page:Science vol. 5.djvu/107

 SluARV 30, J885.]

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��igether, this sj-stemalic use of [lie balloon Tor the study of special meteorological condi- tions most be regarded as a new departure; and the signal-service is to be congratulated ^p ita successful initiatioD.

��■^ THE KOWAK RIVER.

Tjik map opposite shows the explomtions niarff by the U. S. revenue marine on the Kowak or Koak River during the season of lW«t. The asterisk indicates the farthest ex- plored point on the river. The native seflle- ments are siiown by small black triangles. The course of the lower part of the Selawik Kiver and part of liic Kon-ak delta, indicated in dotted lines, have not been explored. It will be observed thai the new explorations al- most exactly join the c-ourse of the river as laid down on the coast-survej' map of 1>S84 by Dall. fVom Woolfe and Jacobscn's sketch-map. The spelling of the names on the above map has not l>een modiSed to agree with the Innuit pronunciation as obtainetl by Lieut. Cantwell. since the differi'Ut tribes of the region do not prouounce these names uniformly, and the names ' Kowak ' and ' Selawik ' have been adopted on all chaits for many .years. Accord- ing to Lieut. Cantwell, the people of the river call it Ku-ak (or ' big river'). Otiier names areShelawik(.Selawik,or'fi9h ") lake and river, Inx^arik'-choit (lake or 'little sen'). The Btream connecting this with Selawik River Is ^'-yilk ('throat') River: that flowing to Selawik Lake is Ki-&k'-lflk ('fox') River. Others have been referred to in our reiwrt of this exploration. It is probable that thenpper part of the Selawik, taken from the Western union explorations of 1866-G7, is too far to the westward, and that the course of the river is le.i« irregular than alwre indicated: but there are not sufficient data to make this certain, or to alter the chart at present.

�� ��B ancients, though acquainled w[th fossil sliells itnd corals, were wholly ignorant of fosHil plants; nnil the firat mention of any vegetable substance in a state of petrifaction was ntnde by Albertus Magnus about the middle of the thirteenth century. A^rlcola, Oes- ner. and olli«r« Ireaied of petriHed wood In the six- Ie«ntli centiiryj and, during the seventeenth. Major in German;, and notably Lhwyd in England, called

4 tflMw (he Amerioan BMOdiillon for chi^ «.lMnci:nn.n(

��slleiition to ilie i-xistencc of vegetable impressions in the rooks. By the beginning of ibe eigliteentb century considerable collections of mich material ex- isted in tbe Karopean mnsenmi, and this had become the subject of animated discussion. Dendrite hod long been known, and wa« then generally supposed to represent vegetable malter; but in the year 1700 Scheuchzer overthrew thnt doctrine, and established its piu^ty mineral charai'ler.

Prior to this dale the prevailing notions of the times ascribed all fossils to some mysterious cause, and denied their reality as thi.' reinslns of things that

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��there was, however, no hnrninny of opinion. Some looked upon them as divinely created archetypes of living things, others as divine enigmas placed before man to test bis faith, othen still as merely the varied fonni of the subterranean world corresponding to those of tbe earth's surface, while many regarded such objects as purely accidental, or as mere freaks of

Against these predominant mystic views there had, howpver, long existed the theory that these forms, so strikingly similar to real things, might be the petri- fied remains of the life that perished by the Hoachian deluge, and which had been stranded on the moun- tains and highlands of Europe and Asia. This view was countenanced by Martin Luther, and strongly ilefende<l by Alexander ah Aiexandro In the sixteenth century; while towards the close of the seventeenth it secured many earnest advocates, Including Wood- ward of England, and Scheuchxer of fjwitierland. The latter undertook to defend his theory from the evidence furnished by plant-remains; and from this zeal resulted his greatest work, one of the must re- markable of the time, — his ' Herbarium dlluvlanum.' This appeared in 1700, and in it are enumerated and figured many fossil pianla. These impressions were declared to be those of existing and oFteii (amillar species; and we And among them the myrrh of Scrip- ture, Galium, Hippuris, and other well-known forma, So conSdent was Scheuchzer that these were living plants, that In HIS he ventureJ to classify all known impressions according to Touniefon's system, a< drawn up In his 'El^mens dc botanique' in lO&i. The new edition of the 'Herbarium rtiluvianum,' which appeared in 172,1, contained this systenatif table, in which four hundred and forty-five species are enumerated.

This bold stroke aroused an intense interest in the subject, and immediately led to a closer comparison of the fossil with the living flora. In this work, Leibnitz in 1700, and Antoine de Jussieu in 1118, had already led the way by examining certain well-defined impressions, and expressing strong doubts of their identity with any European species. Further inves- tigations were made; and these disagreements soon gave rise to the belief ihat they ware tropical forms which by some convulsion or vicissitude had been brought to Europe, and buried under its soil. This view prevailed until the close of the eighteenth [■en- Lury.

Thus far the idea of ancient or eitinri life lia<<

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