Page:Science vol. 5.djvu/243

 The first year the means diminiahed to February, and then rose. The second year the change was not so regular. This is in marked contrast to the extreme variations from month to month, experienced on the islands of the European polar sea and their vicinity (Jan Mayen, Bear Island, Spitsbergen, Novala Zem- IIh, and Franz Josef Land], as well as in the North- American archipelago. In both seasons the number of auroras increased from September to a maximum in February, and then decreased rapidly. Mean lemperature» (Centigrade) and number qf houTK

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��— We learji from the Alheaatum thai three new tidal observatories have recently been established In Indian seas, — one at Cochin, and two at Ceylon, There are now. in all, twelve such observatories In those seas, each continuing its work for a period of five years, aa tidal observation has this advantage over land meteoroii^y, — that, after a limited time, a particular locality is exhausted, and the instruments can be taken up and moved elsewhere. These obser- vatories have recently absorbed a great deal of the attention of the Indian survey deparimenl; although their results bear only in a strictly scientific way upon the operations of the trigonometrical survey, and in helping to correct the charts and tables which arc furnished to the practical navigator.

— The Jnrfependent pracUtioner (or January con- tains an article by Dr. J. G. Van Marler of Rome, upon evidences of prehistoric dentistry in Italy. In the museum of Corneto-Tarquinius, a city on the Mediterranean coast, the author found two specimens of ancient denllatry, which the mayor of that city certifies were found upon the first opening of the buried Etruscan tombs. Professor Helbig further assures him that these were virgin tombs, which date hack four or five hnndred years before Uie Christian era. In one of the specimens the two superior cen- tral incisors are bound by a band of very soft gold to the Uelh on either side. The artificial teeth are well carved, evidently from the tooth of some large ani- mal. One other artificial tooth was held by the same band, but it is lost. Dr. Van Marter has in his own poasessioii a skull In which the first upper molar on the right side Is missing, and which shows plain

��marks of an alveolar abscess, proving conclusively the existence of toothache among the early Etruscans. As the tombs have bean only slightly explored, and as only the noted men of Etruria were embalmed, the rest being cremated. It is not strange that these evi- dences of dentlatry have been so long undiscovered.

— At a meeting of the Society Isis, Jan. 15, Profes- sor Herapel, Dresden, Saxony, made a communica- tion concerning his chemical analysis of the atr, especially of the air collected daily by Prof, E. Hagen during ids voyage from Liverpool to New York Iti 1SS3. The results may he summed up as follows: 1. The quantity of oxygen changes from day to doy by one-half percent; 2. The quantity of oxygen in the air seems to be larger the lower the barometer, and vice eer»a; 3. The air taken on the ocean, compared with the air taken by Professor Hempel the same day at Dresden, shows the same composiUun. The quan- tity of oxygen may vary on different days by one-half per cent; but the air from the ocean varied from the air of Dresden only by some hundredth pans of one per cent. Professor Hempel intends to continue his studies, and hopes to receive sets of tubes with air obtained from the meteorological stations nearest the north pole and the equator, and from one between, perhaps from Heligoland. He expects Ui Snd varia- tions in the quantity of oxygen In these widely sepa- rated places, though Ihey were not Found in the specimens obtained In Dresden, and on the voyage from Liverpool to New York, because both are of about the same latitude, and influenced by the same currents of wind. Professor Hempel intends, there- fore, next fall to go to New York, crn Teneriffe, and to collect on the top of the peak, and at the bottom, air from the upper and lower trade winds.

— According to notes made by Mr. L. Belding at Zorlllo and other places near La Paz, Lower Cali- fornia, in 18S3, the Perlcue Indians, the original in- habitants of that region, are now represented by a sin- gle Individual, — an old woman of about seventy year:'. who was universally reputed to be a pure-blooded In- dian, the last of her race. She was of good stature, robust frame, and dark complexion. The Indians south of 24° SC buried their dead in caves, or below shelving rocks, without regard to the points of the compass. The bones which were found were usually painted red. The skeleton of an adult male, found by Mr. Belding. was wrapped in cloth made from the bark of the palm, and bound with three-ply cord, plaited as sailors make sennit, the material being the fibre of the agave. The package, which was alwut twenty inches long, nearly all the bones having been disjoint- ed, did not appear to have been disturbed since burial, although a femur and some of the small hones n missing. This skeleton was found In a amall ci Zorlllo, the floor of which was covered about a foot deep with dry, coarse sand, formed from the disinte- grating granite rock.

— This last season a smalt apple-tree on the sliore of Todos Santos Bay, Lower California, blossomed and bore large, perfect fruit on its trunk, about an inch from the ground.

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