mains of large towns at Penj Deh, Killa-i-Maur, Meruchak, and Karawal Khana indicate a state of prosperity once existing in these valleys which has long passed away.

Passing from the physical features of the country to describe the character and mode of life of the population, he said there was a marked difference between the Afghans and Turcomans. In Penj Deh, the principal valley of Bagdis, they scarcely ever saw an armed man, and found the Sariks, instead of being the dreaded alaman-sweeping and slave-dealing people they came to see, an industrious, hard-working race, at that time busy from morning to night in the excavation and clearing of their canals, always moving about with a spade having a somewhat triangularshaped blade continually across their shoulders. The Sariks were stalwart men of good physique, resembling very much in character the Turks. A shrewd,

from 4 s. 6 d. to 6s. With regard to the Turcoman horses, the conclusion arrived at by the officers with him, and he believed also by the Russians, was that the Turcoman horse has altogether been overrated, and that in many respects he is inferior to the numerous herds bred in more mountainous tracts, such as the Kuttighanie of Afghan Turkestan. The Turcoman women do a vast amount of work: they fabricate carpets, purdahs for doors, work-bags, horse-clothing, nummads, and blankets; and, when a young woman is engaged, it is thought to be the right thing for her to work all the kibitka domestic carpets and other household requisites before she is married. When, however, they do marry without having completed this task, it is expected from them, that as soon as practicable, by their own labor, they may refund in cash or kind, to their husbands, the dowry paid to parents on marriage. Such dowry generally consists

hard-headed, practical people, they continually expressed their desire for security and permanent settlement. These Sariks, along with their brethren of the Tekke, Salor, and other Turcoman tribes, had been for a century the scourge of northern Persia: they had swept the inhabitants away from valley after valley down the Hari-Rud, almost as far as Seistan and westward, within a hundred and fifty miles of Teheran itself. From the slave-trade and plunder secured in these raids they had amassed comparatively great wealth, and they certainly seemed better off than most Asiatic races. The slave-trade and raiding having been entirely abolished, owing to the action of Russia and the closing of the markets, these Turcomans now eagerly seek for a source from which they can secure wealth, and maintain their present prosperity. They own great herds of sheep, amounting in 1884 to an aggregate of 194,250, divided into flocks of from 700 to 1,500 each. They have hitherto generally disposed of their sheep in the Bokhara and Oorgunj markets. On the spot the price of sheep is from 4 s. to 8 s. 6 d., according to age and quality, the latter sum being the price for a four-year-old; camels fetch about £6 10 s.; horses, from £13 to £25; bullocks, £2 10 s. to £3; cows, £2 to £2 10 s.; and goats,

Sarik Turcoman.

of 100 sheep and 40 tillas, which the bridegroom either pays down in a lump sum to the parents of the bride or by stipulated instalments. The trade of Penj Deh is carried on entirely by Jews, of which there are some twenty families settled here: they are offshoots from the Jewish colony at Herat. They number something like three hundred and fifty families, and have in their hands most of the trade with Balkh, Bokhara, Khiva, and Merv.

After quoting copious extracts from Capt. Maitland's description of the hitherto little-known tract lying between the Murghab and Hari-Rud Rivers along the Gumbegli route, as well as Capt. Yate's account of the interesting natural feature of the Nomaksar, or salt lakes of Yar-oilan, he summed up by saying that the country was one capable of great resources. The climate is good; the winter is cold; and great storms are not unfrequent during the winter months, indeed the commission experienced one as late as the 2d of April; the spring and autumn, however, are beautiful; and the summer, though hot, is nothing to the extremes of heat to which one is accustomed in the plains of India. It is possible even to live in tents, or kibitkas; and, under the shelter of a roof, such luxuries as punkahs would be superfluous.

With a settled government and increased population, there is no reason why this should not become one of the most prosperous tracts of central Asia.

GEOGRAPHICAL NOTES.

THE fifth expedition of the Belgian international African association, which started with the view of connecting by a chain of stations the east coast with the interior basin, has returned, the expense proving too great to render the project profitable. The Zanzibar agent of the society has returned to Europe. The efforts of the association at present will probably be confined to the Kongo watershed.

The death of Mirambo, the noted chief of Unyamuezi, is confirmed. His principal rival, Kapira, is also dead. The power of the former was so great an element in securing peace and security of travel, that his death seems a public misfortune. The son of M'tesa is reported to have succeeded his father. He is young and intelligent, and favorably disposed toward Europeans. He was for several years a pupil of Father Levinhac, recently consecrated bishop of Uganda.

Lieut. Hovgaard intends to visit the east coast of Greenland next year at the expense of the Danish government. Herr August Gamel, the owner of the steamer Dimfna, has placed it at his disposal. The majority of copies of the work known as Meddelser om Grönland,' published by the Danish government, and which received one of the annual medals of the Paris société de géographie, were burned in the recent conflagration at the palace of Christianborg in Copenhagen.

Caspari has reported on the station of Sheik Said at Cape Bab-el-Mandeb, claimed by France. It appears to be a desert spot, with an exposed roadstead, severe heats, no vegetation, and the fresh water scarce and bad. There is a shallow lagoon containing many fish, out of which a small community of Arabs manage to gain a living. Altogether it would seem a most unpromising spot for a European colony.

La société des études historiques, Paris, offers a prize of one thousand francs, or a medal of equal value, to the author of the best memoir on the following subject: A study of the consequences, from the point of view of political economy, of the new relations between Europe and West America, eastern Asia and Polynesia, which would follow the completion of the Panama canal." For conditions, competitors should address M. L. Racine, administrator of the society, 62 boulevard de Courcelles.

Assan Khan Saniéduleh, minister to the shah of Persia, has sent to the Paris geographical society a memoir on the district and town of Maybaud, another on the region of Kelat-i-Nadiri, with a map, and the first volume of a series of three, to be devoted to Khorassan, all in the Persian language.

A steamer called the Industrie, of 513 tons, has arrived at Cologne, March 18, being the first vessel to enter that port direct from an ocean voyage. It is

expected that she will prove the forerunner of an important commerce.

The missionaries of Uzigay in the equatorial lake region of Africa report that the use of a sort of beer made of bananas has been used by them with excellent results as a prophylactic against malarial fevers. Owing, as they suppose, to its use, they have enjoyed in that pestilent region the best of health. The matter seems worthy of investigation.

Teisserenc de Bort writes, that, midway between Khurd-Rumed and Beresof, his party had discovered a depression called by the inhabitants Sebkha Zeita, six or eight kilometres in extent, which forms a lake during the wet season. It is surrounded by an almost circular chain of dunes, between which and the lake are found very numerous chipped flints and other vestiges of man, including hundreds of hearths where the stones show traces of fire.

ASTRONOMICAL PROGRESS IN 1884.

PROFESSOR NEWCOMB contributes to vol. ix. of Appletons' annual cyclopaedia, just published, an interesting article on 'Astronomical phenomena and progress during the year 1884.' In observatories and instruments, he notes the completion of the Lick observatory, with the exception of its equatorial; and the mounting of the great telescopes at the University of Virginia and at Pulkowa, the latter of thirty inches aperture, the largest refractor yet made. In solar physics, Langley's Mount-Whitney work receives first attention, and the tardy appearance of the sun-spot maximum in 1884 (one or perhaps two years behindtime) is remarked. From recent determinations of the velocity of light, the solar parallax is found to be 8.794", and the corresponding distance of the sun, in round numbers, 93,000,000 miles, "which is not likely to be altered by much more than 100,000 miles by any future discoveries."

Recent observations on Jupiter appear to show that the period of rotation at its equator is more than five minutes less than in the latitude of the great red spot, -a result which is of great interest, as tending to confirm the suspected resemblance of that planet to our sun. Saturn, during the winters of 1884, 1885, and 1886, is in an unusually favorable situation for observation; and we may expect valuable testimony on the disputed variability of the rings, and on the many interesting physical phenomena which the planet presents. The asteroids and comets of the year receive due notice. Attention is called to Professor Pickering's inventions in photometry, which have provided us with a standard catalogue of the magnitudes of over four thousand stars,— ' Harvard photometry.' By a very elaborate calculation, Professor Oppolzer has investigated the question whether the excess of the moon's apparent acceleration above its computed value may not arise from the mass of the earth being gradually increased by the falling of meteors upon its surface. He concludes that a precipitation of cosmic dust of about

one-thousandth of an inch in a year would account for the difference. In stellar parallax we find the important work of Gill and Elkin at the Cape of Good Hope, and the surprising results of the Pulkowa observations, which, if confirmed, will place the star Aldebaran among the three or four nearest of the fixed stars. Professor Newcomb mentions the spectroscopic investigations of the motions of stars in the line of sight, observations of the companion of Sirius, cataloguing stars by photography, and the red sunsets, and concludes with a review of the conclusions of the International meridian conference, and a notice in regard to the communication of astronomical discoveries, and the recently founded Watson and Draper astronomical prizes.

WATER-SUPPLY FOR NEW YORK.

MR. J. T. FANNING, who is well and favorably known to the profession by his valuable treatise on water-supply engineering, prefaces a study of the present and future water-supply of New York 1 by a couple of pages, giving a brief historical summary of the establishment of the Croton aqueduct, which at its opening in 1842 supplied the city, then having a population of less than one-third of a million, with an average of twelve million gallons of water daily. The history of the rapid increase in the consumption of water, next given, shows that by 1875 the demand for water had reached the limiting capacity of the aqueduct, which amounted to a daily average of ninety-five million gallons. Since 1875 "the public fountains have ceased, one after another, to flow. Drinking-fountains for either man or beast have been almost unknown of late in the public streets. Meters have been applied in charitable institutions, as well as in manufacturing establishments, and the most stringent measures taken to prevent waste, and at times most urgent appeals made to save the consumption, that the evils of an approaching water famine might be lessened." The New-York water department estimates that the works now in progress will draw from the Croton watershed a daily average of two hundred and fifty million gallons (see Science, No. 124).

On the basis of numerous statistical tables given in the report, as to increase of population and of water-consumption, the attempt is made to estimate the period during which these new works will provide a sufficient supply for the city, and for the population which must draw its water from the city supply.

In making this estimate, the needs of the city are taken to include a sufficient supply for the ordinary uses to which water is applied in our larger cities, not excluding those uses in manufacturing establishments for the lack of which business must be curtailed, or settle elsewhere.

The conclusion reached in this report is, that, before

1 Report No. 2, on a water-supply for New York and other cities of the Hudson valley. By J. T. FANNING, C.E. New York, 1884. 36 P.. 3 8°. maps.

the year 1898, the regular increase of population and the expansion of business will require the whole of the projected average supply of two hundred and fifty million gallons per diem, and that before 1930 four times that amount may be needed.

Having thus determined that the total available supply from the Croton watershed cannot in any event answer probable legitimate demands for much more than a single decade, the author, in looking to other gathering-grounds from which to draw a sufficient supply for future needs, regards the head waters of the Hudson River in the Adirondack region as the most available source, provided the city is to be supplied by gravitation with water of unexceptionable quality, in adequate quantities, and at a pressure due to a head of two hundred feet or more above tide water, such as will carry water to the upper floors throughout the city.

Careful surveys show that a canal sixty feet wide, thirteen feet deep, and somewhat over two hundred miles long, would carry five hundred million gallons of water per diem from near Fort Edward to New York. The estimated cost of this conduit is nearly thirty million dollars; and the auxiliary structures, storage-basins, necessary tunnelling, etc., twenty-five million dollars: total, fifty-five million dollars. It is proposed that the canal run on the highlands east of the Hudson River at an initial elevation of three hundred and fifty feet above tide water, and that this source be also used as the water-supply for the cities and towns on both sides of the river, between Albany and New York, having, according to the census of 1880, an aggregate population of quarter of a million souls, besides the million and three-quarters in New York and Brooklyn. Detailed surveys and the statistics of annual rainfall show that the Adirondack watershed is capable of furnishing an average of nearly fourteen hundred million gallons daily without trespassing upon the river-supply available for canal and manufacturing interests.

This grand and beneficent project must evidently, before many years, be put in process of actual construction. It is greatly to be desired that the state of New York should, as soon as may be, put a stop to the destruction of the Adirondack forests, and reserve a principal part of that region for a park, thus preserving this region as a sanitarium for the commonwealth, as well as the source of a beautiful supply of good healthful water for the entire Hudson valley.

which is the only instrument that permits the drawing of a curve from a series of heads by taking for each ray the mean in the series. The mean curve for each series shows that all the frontal rays of distinguished men are much greater than in the assassin, and that in a savage race, the Neo-hebrides, taken for comparison from four heads, the frontal development is even less than among assassins.

These last two curves cross the first in the parietal part, in the neighborhood of the bregma; and the posterior development of assassin and savages is greater in all points than that of distinguished men. In all the distinguished men the occipital rays were less developed than in the other series, though this difference is less marked. The maximum rays, represented in the diagram by dotted lines, are in distinguished

and that the generic term 'corn' was applied among Northmen to this grain only from the oldest times; and that in the Norwegian laws of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, wherever reference was made to the 'Kornskat' (or standard by which land in the northern lands was, and still is, rated in accordance with the corn it is capable of yielding), the term was understood to apply to barley. Proof of the high latitude to which the cultivation was carried in early ages is afforded by the Egil's Saga, where mention is made of a barn in Helgeland (65° north latitude) used for the storing of corn, and which was so large that tables could be spread within it for the entertainment of eight hundred guests. In Iceland barley was cultivated from the time of its colonization, in 870, till the middle of the fourteenth century,

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men at the 35° line, while in the other two classes it is found at the back of the head, between the 80° and 85° ray. This rule is not so infallible that we can pick out men, and say this is a distinguished man, this an ordinary man, and this a criminal, simply by the shape of the head; but it can be said that seventy-five in a hundred learned men have the superior character, while at least ninety-five in a hundred assassins have the inferior character. A third part of Dr. Bajenoff's work deals with the cranial projection (total, posterior, anterior, and facial) and the facial angle. These confirm his first experiments. Among distinguished persons the anterior cranial portions are the best developed, while among savages and assassins the facial and posterior projections exceed the others.

ORIGIN OF THE CEREALS.1

RECENT numbers of Naturen contain interesting papers, by Professor Schübeler, on the original habitat of some of the cereals, and the subsequent cultivation in the Scandinavian lands and Iceland of barley and rye more especially. It would appear that barley was cultivated before other cereals in Scandinavia; 1 From Nature of June 4.

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or, according to Jón Storrason, as lately as 1400. From that period down to our own times, barley has not been grown in Iceland with any systematic attention, the islanders being dependent on the home country for their supplies of corn. In the last century, however, various attempts were made, both by the Danish government and private individuals, to obtain homegrown corn in Iceland; and the success with which these endeavors were attended gives additional importance to the systematic undertaking which has been set on foot by Dr. Schübeler and others, within the last three years, for the introduction into the island of the hardier cereals, vegetables, and fruits. As many as three hundred and eighty-two samples of seeds of ornamental and useful plants, most of which were collected from the neighborhood of Christiania, are now being cultivated at Reykjavik under the special direction of the local government doctor, Herr Schierbeck, who succeeded in 1883 in cutting barley ninety-eight days after the sowing of the seed, which had come from Alten (70° north latitude). And here it may be observed that this seems the polar limit in Norway for any thing like good barley-crops. The seed is generally sown at the end of May, and in favorable seasons it may be cut at the end of August, the growth of the stalk being often two inches and a half in twenty-four hours. North of 60° or 61°, barley cannot be successfully grown in Norway at more than from eighteen hundred to two thousand feet above the sea-level. In Sweden the polar limit is about 68° or 66°; but even there, as in Finland, night frosts prove very destructive to the young barley. In some of the fjeld valleys of Norway, on the other hand, barley may, in favorable seasons, be cut eight or nine weeks after its sowing; and thus two crops may be reaped in one summer. According, even, to a tradition current in Thelemarken, a farm there owes its name, Triset, to the three crops reaped in the land in one year. Rye early came into use as a bread-stuff in Scandinavia, and in 1490 the Norwegian council of state issued an ordinance making it obligatory on every peasant to lay down a

certain proportion of his land in rye. In Norway the polar limit of summer rye is about 69°, and that of winter rye about 61°; but in Sweden it has been carried along the coast as far north as 65°. The summer rye-crops are generally sown and fit for cutting about the same time as barley, although occasionally in southern Norway less than ninety days are required for their full maturity.

CASSINO'S STANDARD NATURAL HISTORY.

6

THE editors of the Standard natural history' have undertaken a most difficult and praiseworthy work. The aim set in the prospectus is to give "a popular account of the whole animal kingdom by the best American authorities," and American forms are to be made especially prominent. Mr. J. S. Kingsley is editor-in-chief, and each type or class is described by some naturalist who has made special investigations in that group. The work is to be completed in six imperial octavo volumes. Of these, two treat of invertebrates, three of vertebrates except man, and the sixth of the human races. Three of them have already

been completed.

It is a labor requiring no small study and diligence to collate the immense mass of terribly

scattered notes and articles on American zoölogy. But the great danger is, of course, that the work will be too abstruse for popular use, or too popular for scientific accuracy and value. Both these extremes have been uniformly avoided by the different writers with a skill hardly to be expected, and worthy of all praise. There is, too, no such lack of unity or uniformity as one would expect from so large a corps of editors. The figures are remarkably clear and fine. Indeed, the first question that occurs to

us is whether some of the luxury in heavy paper, wide margins, and striking full-page cuts, might not well have been dispensed with in order to lower the price of the work, and give it the circulation which it deserves: for to many young students, and teachers in our schools and academies, this work would be the very best help; and yet to them especially the price, six dollars a volume, will be an insuperable obstacle.

The introduction, which occupies seventy pages of the first volume, opens with an account of protoplasm and the cell. In the whole introduction only five pages are devoted to embryonic development. This subject is treated

The standard natural history. Edited by J. S. KINGSLEY. Vol. i. Lower invertebrates; vol. ii. Crustacea and insects; vol. v. Mammals. Boston, Cussino, 1884-85. 8°.

under each group in the systematic portion of the work only in a general and very meagre outline. This is perhaps wise in a popular work, but for that very reason it should have been described in the introduction as fully as is consistent with a purely general outline. Twenty pages are devoted to the nervous system and animal psychology, forming a brief but admirable epitome of what is known of this as yet almost unexplored field. The single page devoted to alternation of generations and parthenogenesis is the least satisfactory in the introduction: the statement is meagre, the line of argument any thing but clear. Evolution is discussed in twelve pages, six of which are devoted to a history of the theory and résumé of the contributions of American students. It is certainly one of the most marked defects of intense interest should not have been fully prethe work, that this subject of universal and sented; all the more, because the age, investigations, and views of the writer fitted him to give us a fair and impartial discussion of the subject.

Of the systematic portion of the first volume, one can but notice the generally high character of the work. It does great credit to its editors. Especial notice should perhaps be given to the interesting discussion of the origin

and formation of coral islands. The editor of the chapter on Vermes, the most difficult and least familiar branch, has given too little of the anatomy, and has hardly attempted to show the resemblance and affinities between the different classes. It is certainly a pity that the Brachiopoda, which have so many points of interest, should be dismissed with only three Their enormous abundance in early pages. geologic ages, together with the long battle so hotly waged over their affinities and systematic position, should gain for them more attention, and the more so that this conflict originated through the writings of an American naturalist. Even some of their most important anatomical characteristics are not stated; and of their great geological importance as the predecessors of Mollusca, we have scarcely a hint. But, if the introduction and the description of all the invertebrates except Arthropoda must find place in one volume, we ought, perhaps, to be thankful that some groups are not crowded out altogether. The Tunicata are not described in this volume, and hence will probably appear either before or among the lower invertebrates, after all, their only proper position at the present stage of investigation. The volume closes with a full and very readable description of Mollusca.