Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1884-05-24

| quarter OF an hour studying the form and
| pose of a rosy spoonbill or a flamingo
On the shelves behind the cases of birds Is
the
COLLECTION OF FISHES
In alcohol. considered fairly representa-
tive lot. Upstairs is the collection of shells
all these things are from the Pacific coast
by the way-but such is the uncomfortable
cupidity of conchologi>ts that the authori-
ties have been obliged to lock up the shells
as the British Museum has discovered the
necessity for locking up its collections of
coins. No one touched with collectors
mania can be trusted in the unguaried
presence of the objects he is interested in.
Upstairs also, in a little Office built up on
two sides with more mustv bookcases
works Mrs. Mary Curran, an enthusiastic
botanist, employed by the academy to svs-
tematize Its herbarium. She has herself
discovered two perfectly new species of
plants and just beyond the Park species
of fungus, the Polyplocillnl, only found
elsewhere in South Africa on the Orange
river, She was making her preparations
the day of my visit to the academy for
an excursion into the wilds to collect speci-
mems for her favOrite science At the west
ern end of the south gallery DR.. Hardness
has his office. The Doctor is Vice Presi-
to be found at the rooms-a tit presiding
genius. He showed me some specimens of
the Hcssian fly that is troubling wheat
growers 50 much | asked him if his ex-
aminations resulted in the discovery of any
remedy against tie pest, but he said there
was none except the very primitive one of
leaving fallOw for a long time the land
which the fly had infested, when the insect
would seek other fields and then wheat
raising might be safely resumed. He
showed me number of phials containing
specimens of cynips, the insects that cause
the oak to put forth house for their
young, the oak apples or oak gals that are
so common. The Doctors proficiency in
studies was nearly the cause
for his being retained in sertain cele-
brated case in which microscopes are play
ing an important part. lie has in prepara-
ton work on fungi, to contain the study
and experiment of many years There is
no expressing in words the pleasant air of
AGE AND sEcLUsIoH
About the old academy, yet there is no de
nylng that its usefulness would be in
creased if it were possible to examine the
books now done up in packages of wrap
ping paper to protect them from dust and |
vermln. The Lick estate will enrich the |
academy at its settlement. which is now |
looked for in Il year or two, when the |
academy will build proper Judgment for |
its debates and its collections Then let us |
hope that part of the golden shower will |
TALL upon the museum. that collection of |
geology, pal@ontology, zoology and natural |
history donated to the academy by Chas. !
Croker and Leland Stanford Now il is |
hidden away in Mercantile Library Hall. |
only visible on Saturday after | o'clock |
md then found without a catalogue and |
very badly placed labels. Mr. Gibbs, one
IF the directors of the museum has ar
ranged some manuscripts about cliff dwell
ers in New Mexico and Colorado. and the
canyon dwellings of the Zunis, which are
)n desks by the side of terra Gotta models of |
hese strange habitations, but otherwise the
possible instructivcness of the museum is
ost and its real interest principally for
specialists alone. 1t is odd to see a card
With Chinese characters by the side of the
specimens, cards expressing hands off in |
he Mongol tongue. 1t Is odd because it
estifeS to such a number of visitors of this
The most wonderful part of
he museum is that occupied by the casts
If pre- historic animals made by Professor
Henry A. Ward, of Rochester The re-
tored mammoth in the center of the hall
With his sixteen feet of hight and twenty
tx feet of length, his curving tusks and
haggy hide, shows, if not what animals
we're, at least what our present scientists
,elieve them to have been. Looking at the
asts of the gigantic sloth, the Irish elk, the
the serpent;necked pleSiosaurus
nd the black, long-nosed, alligator-like
it is easy to believe that ii
coupled fifteen years of Professor Wards
ife to prepare the molds for these marvel
us restorations. Among the casts of fossil
Impressions is one of
THE CARSON FOOTPRINTS,
aiken by Dr. Hardness. 1t is huge ,
fair. thirteen or fourteen inches long and /,
idiculously like the human foot in shape
here is cannibal's bowl, made an the
admiralty Islands, for the carving of hui
lan beings 1t is deep black bowl, four ,,
.et in diameter and three feet deep. 1t is
f black wood, intensely hard and proba-
" followed by the action of fire and the
owl with its three feet, is hewn from one
lock of wood There is cast of the head J
the Ncauderthal man. constructed by a
dentist from the simple Uranium discov- =
red III the Neauderthal in Switzerland.
here is also a little Typographical model 7
f Montezuma'S well, beautiful lake, i'll a
ne high banks of which Indians have i
lade their dwellings i'll excavations. The
luseum deserves TO be better known and
etter placed. 1t is wonderful collection, \
record of the otherwise unknowable, for
ldless reading of fossil phenomena will {
OF make the story in the rocks halt so
resent and SO comprehensive as one
ance at these faithful reproductions of
ones and skeletons Just as they are found
, tho dcposits in India Siberia and North n