low-lying tundra or of steep dark-colored cliffs of broken-down granite. The island is largely of volcanic origin, with an occasional symmetrical cone visible in the interior (see Fig. 3). Some of the peaks and plateaus in the central and eastern sections reach a height of I500 feet or more; at the western end the highest elevations are along the coasts, with intervening stretches of low marshy tundra and numerous lakes and lagoons. For six months or more of the year the island is locked in ice, which does not finally leave its shores until late in June. At the present time the inhabitants, belonging to the Siberian or Yuit group of Eskimos, number some four hundred, the remnants of a much larger population which was greatly reduced by a severe famine and epidemic during the winter of I878-I879. Vegetation is of the usual arctic variety, consisting mainly of dwarf willows, mosses, grasses, saxifrages, and other flowering plants. To judge from fossil remains there existed in Tertiary times a markedly different assemblage of plants including sequoia, poplar, sycamore, and alder,1 evidence of the Tertiary land connection between Asia and America postulated to explain the many and close resemblances between the plant and animal life of the two continents. From an anthropological standpoint the Bering Strait region is of equal theoretical importance, for it was through this gateway that man also must have entered America. But no trace of these first migrants has yet been discovered around Bering Strait and from present indications may never be, unless through some lucky accident. If man migrated into America during the glacial period any remains Athat he might have left behind in northern Alaska would now lie deeply buried beneath the frozen muck and ground ice and would