known the periods to be of seventy-two hours' duration. Furthermore they have discovered five other wind passages in the vicinity of the cave, within a radius of two miles, one of which, Jasper Cave, located one and one-half miles to the westward, is similarly held as a mining location by S. V. and Vance I. Coc, and is a considerable passage as yet unexplored. Several hundred dollars have been expended in developing this claim in a search for manganese, but mineral in paying quantities was not found. They have also observed the action of the wind in these openings and have found it to correspond very closely with that of Jewel Cave.

The Michaud brothers, believing that they had discovered a cave which would be of great interest to tourists, erected a loghouse nearby for the accommodation of a few visitors. They advertised the cave in a small way locally and charged a moderate fee for their services as guides in showing parties through the cave, but they were unable to attract enough people to make this a financial success. They believed, therefore, that an additional attraction was necessary; hence the idea of the game preserve.

A petition to create a game preserve to be known as the Jewel Cave Game Preserve was, therefore, originated and circulated among the settlers of this locality. Among those prominent in the promotion of this scheme was Judge Charles E. Smith who was State's Attorney of Custer county during the years 1905-6, and who left Custer, South Dakota, in the early part of 1907 for Omaha, Nebraska, where he is now practicing law. Judge Smith interested Col. William H. Parker, M. C., in the project, who had some correspondence in relation thereto with the Supervisor of the Black Hills National Forest. The Supervisor referred the matter for an investigation and report to Forest Assistant H. C. Neel; Surveyor C. W. Fitzgerald was later instructed by Smith. Riley, Chief Inspector in charge of District No. 2, to accompany Mr. Neel on the examination of the area and to make a joint report with him.

The area of the Jewel Cave National Monument embraces the northern halves of sections 2 and 3 of Township 4 south, and the southern halves of sections 34 and 35 of Township 3 south, of Range 2 east, Black Hills meridiana tract measuring one mile north and south by two miles east and west. It is part of a high rolling limestone plateau about 6,000 feet above sea level, broken by numerous ravines, which run into the two main canyons draining this area. Jewel Cave is situated in Hell Canyon. About one mile above Jewel Cave Hell Canyon forks into three branches, locally known as East Hell Canyon, Hell Canyon and West Hell Canyon. All of the branches have high precipitous walls and are very winding and picturesque. In the east fork is found the only stream in which water flows throughout the year within this area. This stream heads at Bull Spring and Alkali Springs east of the tract and sinks in the bed of the canyon a short distance above Jewel Cave.

Those who wanted a large game preserve advocated a reservation of sixty square miles, but Messrs. Neel and Fitzgerald recommended only the two square miles before described. They said that very few of the settlers in the vicinity of the proposed game reserve or towns nearby were in favor of setting aside sixty square miles for a game preserve, because the exclusion from Custer county of this area, in which a number of settlers can be located and which is capable of supporting a large number of grazing animals, would retard to that extent the development and prospective revenue of the county. They also observed that there was no scientific need of a game preserve for the preservation of animals indigenous to the Black Hills, because those animals are identical with those found in the Rocky Mountains within the Yellowstone National Park, for the preservation of which, among other purposes, that park was created and is maintained.

Furthermore, an area of sixty square miles was hardly extensive enough for a game preserve.

Because of those reasons the establishment of Jewel Cave Game Preserve was not recommended, and the smaller area, containing the Jewel Cave, Jasper Cave and the nearby wind passages, was adopted for the Jewel Cave National Monumeent.

JAMESTOWN ISLAND, VIRGINIA.

Gratifying as has been the action of the government in rcserving from its own domain National Monuments of the character of the Jewel Cave, it has been a source of disappointment to this Society that its recommendations for the creation by purchase of a National Monument embracing Jamestown Island, Virginia, have as yet borne no fruit. As stated in several of our Annual Reports, this island, embracing about 1,600 acres of land, is the site of the first permanent English-speaking settlement in the New World. The three hundredth anniversary of the planting of the Jamestown colony was celebrated last year by a great exposition held at Sewall's Point, thirty-five miles away, or as far as Provincetown, Mass., is from Plymouth and the only honor which the historic site itself received at the hands of the government was the erection of a $50,000 monument on a strip of land 125 x 450 feet in size which the government insisted should be donated. This seems to us to be an inadequate recognition of the actual site of an event so important as to warrant so large an expenditure elsewhere for celebration. Here the fathers of the nation made the first efforts to conquer the country. Here occurred the first death, the first marriage, the first trial by jury, the first legislative assembly and many other fundamental events in our early life as a people and nation. It is difficult to conceive of a site of more historic significance.

Furthermore, the place is of great archæological interest. There is no contemporaneous map of the ancient Jamestown

known to exist; but all over the island are found buried ruins which, if scientifically explored, would throw a flood of light on the obscure history of the place. Some of these sites have already been excavated and yielded relics of the greatest interest.

As a single illustration of what may be found, even on the surface, by the observant visitor, may be mentioned the fossil whale vertebra found by the President of this Society on a brief visit during 1907. This fossil was examined by Dr. F. W. True, head curator of biology of the National Museum at Washington, who has furnished the following description:

"This is one of the last thoracic vertebræ of a fossil whalebone whale about forty-five feet long, not unlike the recent finback called the Pollock whale (Balaenoptera borealis). The American species cannot at present be identified from single thoracic, lumbar or caudal vertebræ in most cases. This vertebræ probably belonged to a whale of that section of the genus Cetotherium called Plesiocetus by Van Beneden, and is nearest the European species P. brialmontii. It cannot be associated with any described American species of Cetotherium, as they are all too small or too large. So far as size goes, it is nearest the Rhegnopsis palæatlanticus of Leidy, the type of which came from City Point, James river, Virginia, but this genus is based on characters of the mandible and hence further comparisons are not feasible at present. Vertebra of whalebone whales are very common in the Miocene formations of Maryland and Virginia, and not least so in the vicinity of Jamestown."

Dr. True further states that a restoration of the skeleton of Cetotherium cephalus by Cope will be found in the American Naturalist, 1890, plate 22. (The reduction should be 1/22.7 instead of 1/18.)

THE CORNPLANTER MEDAL.

During the past year, this Society has been in correspondence with Prof. Frederick Starr, of Chicago University, with a