In the
charts of that day Spanish navigators reckoned longitude E. 360
degrees from the meridian of the Isle of Ferro. For the sake of
perspicuity before a modern audience, the more recent meridian of
Madrid was substituted. The custom of dropping a day at some
arbitrary point in crossing the Pacific westerly, I need not say,
remains unaffected by any change of meridian. I know not if any
galleon was ever really missing. For two hundred and fifty years an
annual trip was made between Acapulco and Manila. It may be some
satisfaction to the more severely practical of my readers to know
that, according to the best statistics of insurance, the loss during
that period would be exactly three vessels and six hundredths of a
vessel, which would certainly justify me in this summary disposition
of ONE.
THE PLIOCENE SKULL. This extraordinary fossil is in the possession
of Prof. Josiah D. Whitney, of the State Geological Survey of
California. The poem was based on the following paragraph from the
daily press of 1868: "A human skull has been found in California, in
the pliocene formation. This skull is the remnant not only of the
earliest pioneer of this State, but the oldest known human being. . . .
The skull was found in a shaft 150 feet deep, two miles from Angels
in Calaveras County, by a miner named James Watson, who gave it to
Mr. Scribner, a merchant, who gave it to Dr.
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