Bisbee daily review., 1909-06-22
HUMoR IN GEOLOGICAL
 SCIENCE.
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Mining Seience.l

Recently we visited gentleman who has. during many years. col lected one of the finest libraries of ancient and modern works on geol- ogy and kindred sciences in America. There were volumes We had once heard of, or seen quoted, and others oi whose existence we had never dreamed.
 some of these old books. in fine, large type, written in Latin, were beautifully and layishly illustrated by wcodcuts eXcellently drawn and en- graved. There was one by Linnoeus, published under royal auspices, that contained large full-sized cuts of cry, tals and fossils that would have done credit for clearness and accuracy to the elaborate volumes of the modern U. s. Geological Survey. Another large book that attracted our admira- ton was one devoted to the basaltic occurrences in Europe. Every known occurrence and form of the peculiar columnar structure of these singular volcanic rocks from Fingafs Cave and the Giants Causeway in Ireland. to the extinct volcanoes of Auvergne in France, was artistically drawn on a large scale and engraved.
 While some of these works excited our admiration, there were others that aroused no little merriment. One of these was an elaborate religio- scientific work on geology, published in Latin, by royal consent, recording the wonderful fossil discoveries of an old professor made in the hills back of his university. These discoveries, it was claimed, had a special and con c,ds ve bearing on the authenticity of the Holy Scriptures. It seems that the venerable professor, wandering over the hills did make some genuine discoveries of common fossils His interest was aroused, and after de- scribing and theoriZing on these won ders, he started out in search of more. ftis students, who appear to have loved a practical joke at the ex- pense of the savant, took advantage of his enthusiasm to carve out Of soft stone and clay, forms of their own imagining, and planted them where the professor was sure to find them. Discovery followed discovery and the elaborate wood engravings at the end of the treatise do credit to the in ventive and ingenious powers of the young men. They certainly produced some astonishing fossil forms. such as gigantic caterpillars, centipedes, scorpions and various composite ami nal forms, the like of which had never been unearthed before or have been seen since. Knowing the pro fessor's deep religious bias, and his belief that these discoveries confirm ed the account of creation in the ..f TanAEfz r1s.f 1s1 strengthen this belief by Hebrew characters in the first chapter of Gen esis. The discovery of this was to the professor the crowning proof of the divine authority of that book. for had he not discovered the tables of stone written by the Divine Hand7
 But, like most practical iokers. the young men carried their jokes too far. One day the professor was astounded by digging up tablet on which his own name was found engraved in full capitals He began to smell a rat, and the hoax was exploded, but mean while several elaborate copies of his work. under royal authority. had gone out into the world and had made quite sensation in religious and scientific centers. He hastened to withdraw these and to burn all copies he could lay hands on; some escaped, however, so this delightful geological joke is preserved to this day.
 About the same time. probably stimulated by the success of his broth CT professor, another savant named Schutzer likewise came in his rambles on a genuine and weII-preserved Zoe. sil. This, by dint of ignorance Of anatomy. combined with powerful imagination. was conceived to bear a likeness to the human form. or to the skeleton of a-baby. With the religious .ervor characteristic of the age, the sayapt saw fin this an absolute proof of the authenticity of the account of the flood as described in the Bible Here said he, in his treatise, "is the skeleton of baby of one of that accursed race that perished in the food So he named the fossil. as well as his treatise, Homo diluvii testis"-Man the Proof Of the Deiuge
 The fossil was carefully removed by the royal museum and set up Tn 1uil state. and the treatise. duly illus trated. vert out to the world
 i, Some time after this discovery the naturalist, Cuviar, happening to visii the museum, and seeing the sacred fossil. asked the privilege of removine {, with his penknife some shale that covered it's latter end The permis
 sion was given and caudal append age was reveaiel. considerably long CT even than Derwin would have bar | gained for for his missing link. Gu yier showed that the fossil skeleton was that of large species of lizard
 known to zoologists as batrachian
 So ended the glory of the Andria.
 Schutzeri, or "Schutzer's little man
 The fossil, we believe, can still bt seen in the museum.
 Amusing as are these mistakes at
 time when egologic science was in it'
 infancy, we are reminded that mod
 ern scientists may sometimes err; fo
 instance. a noted paleontologist, in hi'
 restoration of a great fossil saurin re
 sembling the mythical seaport. mis
 taking the caudal or tail vertebrae fo the cervical or neck. vertebrae, stucl the head of the monster onto the III of its tail.--A. L.
 A DOMESTIC EVE REMEDY