Half Feet Research Articles

The Transvaal Fossil Human Skeleton

AT the end of January last a road party, working in the Springbok Flats about eighty miles north of Pretoria, in excavating calcareous ground to make a road, came across a human skeleton and bones of the extinct buffalo (Bubalus Bainii) and of a large antelope. The spot where the bones were found has been visited by Mr. C. J. Swierstra of the Transvaal Museum and Mr. Herbert Lang, and they have taken careful observations of the occurrence. There is a foot and a half of dark reddish-brown surface soil, with below it about six feet of calcareous tufa (Fig. 1). The skeleton was obtained at a depth of three feet from the surface and thus about one and a half feet from the top of the tufa. The bones are for the most part much impregnated with lime and, except the powerful long bones, badly broken. The skull is mostly broken into pieces about the size of half a crown or smaller, but fortunately the mandible is well preserved. In the opinion of Mr. Lang, the man has probably been killed while hunting and his body crushed in the mud by the trampling of a wounded buffalo—not improbably the one whose bones lay near his own. Mr. Swierstra has kindly asked me to make an examination and report on these bones.

Note on a Stone Circle at Melgum Lodge, near Tarland, Aberdeenshire

A small stone circle comprises six surviving stones, two of which have been disturbed. The tallest stone measures only three and a half feet from the existing ground surface.

Expeditions to the Miocene of Wyoming and the Chalk Beds of Kansas

ON July 28 I reached my station at Edgemont, S. D. The next day I drove out to my son Charlie's cabin, thirty-five miles west, on Old Woman creek, in Converse county, Wyoming. I found that, with the assistance of my youngest son, Levi, and Conrad Jesperson, of Lawrence, he had secured a complete series of caudal vertebrae and bones of the pelvis and hind limbs of the great swimming dinosaur Trachodon; and three-quarters of a fine skull, six and a' half feet long, of Triceratops, the huge three-horned lizard of the Laramie. The Trachodon material has gone to Munich to complete a composite open mount, I having sent the other material last year. The magnificent skeleton secured last year by my son Charlie went to the Senckenberg Museum. I believe these are the only complete skeletons of American dinosaurs in Europe. The seven-foot skull I discovered last year of Triceratops, which I was preparing for the Victoria Memorial Museum, was destroyed last year when the brick walls of the building at 617 Vermont street, in which it was housed, was blown in on top of it by a cyclone-a great loss to science and myself. Having gone over the Laramie beds thoroughly during the last four years, on the fourth of August we moved over to the old deserted Seaman ranch on Sage creek, a branch of Old Woman creek, in Converse county, Wyoming. These beds are known as the Upper Harrison beds. The first day in this rich field that has been but little explored, I discovered the skeleton of the great titanothere Brontotherium gigas. The pelvic arch was partly exposed and measured four feet across the illia; the complete skull; vertebral column, with ribs continuous to first caudal; one humerus, and other bones. The lower limbs were absent. This specimen, according to Doctor Matthew, curator of vertebrate palmontology in the American Museuim of Natural History, New York, is the best single specimen known, and is the size of their mounted composite specimen that measures over twelve feet long and about eight feet high. We are now preparing this noble specimen for the Victoria Memorial Museum at Ottawa, Canada, and will secure casts of the feet from the American Museum specimen.

Account of the Excavation of a Broch near Craigcaffie, Inch Parish, Wigtownshire, known as the Teroy Fort

The broch is located on a round rocky prominence and survives to a height of only two and a half feet. The guard chamber survives on the right side of the entrance but does not survive on the left. The division of the guard-chamber into two\r\ncompartments is a peculiar feature, also the facing of its walls with slabs. The wall has been largely removed and it was not possible to determine the position of the stairway. There was no evidence of lengthy occupation and artefacts included some pottery, the upper stone of a rotary quern, a lump of iron, charcoal and burnt bone.

Notice of the Excavation of a Hut-Circle near Ackergill Tower, Wick, Caithness

A report on the excavation of a newly discovered hut circle. The walls were composed of stones laid on sandy soil and survived to a height of one and a half feet. The thickness of the wall was irregular. Two doorways and a stone floor were revealed. A small paved passageway led up to one of the doors. Outside the wall of the hut-circle, and to the left of the entrance, a small chamber completely walled in was found. A few animal bones, shells, two iron objects and a bone pin were recovered during the excavation.

Normally Unequal Growth as a Possible Cause of Death

I HAVE found from a good many years' experience that it is frequently difficult to assign any definite cause of death to the lower Vertebrata which die in the Zoological Society's Gardens from time to time. The examination of a large example of the Japanese salamander (Megalobatrachus japonicus), which lived for a good many (nineteen) years here, and measured some three feet in length, has suggested to me a rather curious and truly “natural” cause of death—if my inferences be correct. The animal showed no obvious signs of disease in any organ. Judging from its length it must have been old, for a specimen three feet, long is asserted to have been at least fifty-two years old (vide Gadow, Cambridge Natural History, “Amphibia and Reptiles,” p. 99), Comparing, this specimen with one some twenty inches in length I found that the size of the heart, as of the other organs, was, as might be expected, actually larger, but that all the subdivisions of the heart were of the same proportions in the two animals. But in the course of a dissection of the heart it was plain that the two series of valves, which lie respectively at the anterior and at the posterior end of the pylangium, were so small, relatively speaking, that, when forced backwards by the pressure of blood in the entire conus arteriosus, they would not meet in the middle line. On the other hand, in the smaller salamander the three Valves in question were in the first place situated closer together than in the large animal, being nearly in actual contact, and in the second place their size was so great in relation to the diameter of the pylangium that they would—or, I should father say, could—meet after the systole of the ventricle. The fact is that these valves do not appear to grow pari passu with the general increase in size of the heart and the conus arteriosus. My own observations as to the small size of the valves in the large example are quite in accord with those of Hyrtl (Cryptobranchus japonicus, Vindobonae, 1865), who dissected an animal two arid a half feet in length, and figures the valves, incorrectly as I believe in some particulars, but correctly in representing them to be of small relative size. It might be suggested, therefore, that the imperfection of the circulatory mechanism necessarily caused by the condition of the valves would lead to serious disturbances, and perhaps to death. If so the animal has a term put to its life by the mere fact that, while the heart grows with the increase in bodily size, the semilunar valves of the conus arteriosus do not.

Michigan Board of Agriculture Annual Report 1898–99

IN this volume are included the thirty-eighth annual report of the Secretary of the Michigan State Board of Agriculture, and the twelfth annual report of the Experiment Station of the State Agricultural College. Many subjects of interest are dealt with in both reports, but only a few can be referred to here. Experiments with Indian corn, to test the influence of thickness of planting upon the character of the crop, show that a gradual increase occurs in the yield of dry matter and protein as the distance between the rows and between individual plants is increased. It appears that, to obtain the greatest yield of valuable nutrients, Indian corn should be planted in rows fully three and a half feet apart, and the seeds six and nine inches apart in the rows. The establishment of several large beet-sugar factories in the State last year has caused increased attention to be given to experiments in beet culture. An interesting detail of some new experimental work, to which reference is made by Prof. C. D. Smith, director of the Experimental Station, is the breeding of bees with longer tongues. It is hoped that, by selection and breeding, a variety of honey bee will be developed capable of extracting nectar from the blossoms of the clover grown in the State.

Science in the Magazines

PROF. H. F. OSBORN, curator of vertebrate palæontology in the American University of Natural History, New York, contributes to the Century Magazine a popular account of prehistoric quadrupeds found in the Rockies during the past few years, and to be exhibited to the public at that museum in October. Interest in his description is greatly increased by nine remarkably fine illustrations (reproduced from water-colour drawings by Mr. Charles Knight), designed to give an idea of the animals as they probably appeared in life in their natural surroundings. Another interesting article in the Century is made up of extracts from the journals of the late Mr. E. J. Glave, whose journey to the Livingstone Tree had such a melancholy termination. On July 8, 1894, Mr. Glave reached the tree beneath which Dr. Livingstone's heart is buried. Jacob Wainwright, the Nassick boy who read the burial service, cut on the tree the words: “Dr. Livingstone, May 4, 1873. Yazuza, Mniasere, Vchopere.” The body was roughly embalmed and carried to Bagamoyo, on the coast opposite Zanzibar, afterwards to be taken to England and buried in Westminster Abbey. As to the tree, Mr. Glave wrote in his journal: “Although done twenty years ago, the inscription is in a splendid state of preservation. The tree shows no disfigurement, and, moreover, the carving is not on the bark but on the grain of the tree itself. It is a hardwood tree, three feet in diameter at the base; at thirty feet it throws out large branches; its top is a thick mass of foliage. When Livingstone died the heart and other viscera were buried beneath this tree, and the bark was cleared off for a space of two and a half feet square; in this space Jacob Wainwright (whose account my discovery verifies to the letter) carved the inscription with no dunce's hand, the letters being well-shaped and bold. The tree is situated at the edge of the grass plain, and is very conspicuous, being the largest tree in the neighbourhood. It is about five miles south south-west from the present site of the village of Karonga Nzofu, an important Bisa chief, whose father was a friend of Livingstone. Chitambo's is now ten miles away. It was originally near the tree; in fact, Livingstone died a few minutes' walk from the old village of Chitambo.” The tablet which Mrs. Bruce—the daughter of Livingstone—sent out by Captain Bia and Lieut. Franqui to commemorate the explorer's death, was put up by them eight miles from the spot where he died, and was afterwards carried off by the chief of a slave caravan.

INTRACRANIAL CLOT FROM INJURY WITHOUT FRACTURE OF THE SKULL.

<i>Case 1</i>.—May 9, 1891, Dr. C. W. Battey requested me to see L. G., aged 5 years, in consultation with him. Four days previously she had fallen fifteen and a half feet, striking her head on a plank sidewalk. She was picked up unconscious, but remained so only for a few moments. Physicians who examined her immediately found no fracture, depressed bone, or other evidence of serious injury. Since the fall she had had no opiate or sedative of any kind, yet had no pain, ate well, bowels open, and slept eighteen hours in twenty-four; answered questions correctly, but hesitatingly; protruded and retracted the tongue like a typhoid patient. Sensation and muscular coördination was perfect. Temperature 99½° F., pulse 72. There was great discoloration of all the palpebrai and ocular tissues, with sufficient œdema to completely close the right eye and prevent inspection of the right pupil. Left pupil responded

Resection of about six and a half feet of the Small Intestine, with Recovery

Resection of about six and a half feet of the Small Intestine, with Recovery

On the Pelorosaurus; an undescribed gigantic terrestrial reptile, whose remains are associated with those of the Iguanodon and other saurians, in the strata of Tilgate Forest

The author had for a long while entertained the idea, that among the remains of colossal reptiles obtained from the Wealden strata, there were indications of several genera of terrestrial saurians, besides those established by himself and other geologists. The recent discovery of an enormous arm-bone, or humerus, of an undescribed reptile of the crocodilian type, in a quarry of Tilgate Forest in Sussex, where Dr. Mantell had many years since collected numerous teeth and bones of the Iguanodon, Hylæosaurus, &amp;c., and some remarkable vertebrae not referable to known genera, induced him to embody in the present communication the facts which his late researches have brought to light. The humerus above-mentioned was found imbedded in sandstone, by Mr. Peter Fuller of Lewes, at about 20 feet below the surface; it presents the usual mineralized condition of the fossil bones from the arenaceous strata of the Wealden. It is four and a half feet in length, and the circumference of its distal extremity is 32 inches ! It has a medullary cavity 3 inches in diameter, which at once separates it from the Cetiosaurus and other supposed marine saurians, while its form and proportions distinguish it from the humerus of the Iguanodon, Hylæosaurus, and Megalosaurus. It approaches most nearly to the Crocodilians, but possesses characters distinct from any known fossil genus. Its size is stupendous, far surpassing that of the corresponding bone even of the gigantic Iguanodon; and the name of Pelorosaurus (from πέλωρ pelor , monster ) is therefore proposed for the genus, with the specific term Conybeari , in honour of the palæontological labours of the Dean of Llandaff.

Observations on a Slab of New Red Sandstone from the Quarries at Weston, near Runcorn, Cheshire, containing the Impressions of Footsteps and other markings.

The notices of fossil impressions of footsteps in the New red sandstone are now sufficiently numerous, as well in Warwickshire and Shropshire as in Cheshire, to take away the interest of novelty from any discovery of this nature; yet I consider the slab about to be described sufficiently new to justify my laying the following account of it before the Geological Society. The summit of the quarry of New red sandstone whence this specimen was extracted by Mr. Feraday Smith is about 100 feet above the level of the Mersey at Weston. The rock is here worked perpendicularly to about fifty feet from the top, and the seams which contain the impressions are two in number and are nearly three feet apart, the higher being twenty-four feet from the top. Both these seams consist of from half to three-quarters of an inch of reddish silty clay, upon which when soft the impressions have been made, and the lower series has larger and better-defined marks than the other. The beds dip to the south-west at an angle of about 10°, and are of a red colour and coarse grain. The slab in question is seven feet long by three and half feet broad. It contains none of the footprints of the so-called Chirotherium (Labyrithodon , Owen), but is full of those of smaller reptiles, apparently both Emydian and Batrachian, besides others which may have been made by birds. It is remarkable for the singular complication of cracks it presents, these forming a

XXI. Eclipses of the satellites of Jupiter, observed by John Goldingham, Esq. F. R. S. and under his superintendance, at Madras, in the East Indies

The following eclipses of the satellites of Jupiter, were observed with achromatic telescopes, by Dollond, of three and half feet focal length, and magnifying power between 70 and 80; having been constructed more immediately for this purpose, for which they were exceedingly well calculated in all respects. An astronomical clock, with gridiron pendulum, and dead beat, regulated by transits of the sun and stars, was used for the time; which was deduced from the transit of the sun nearest the eclipse, and verified by the one immediately preceding or following.