In the Museums

Last week Manhattan's American Museum of Natural History received its first news from the expedition which rich, eccentric Templeton Crocker of San Francisco is conducting in the South Sea islands aboard his big yacht Zaca. The news: Gygis alba, a white, gull-like bird, builds no nest for her solitary, mottled egg but plops it neatly into the fork of a slim tree-branch. She covers the egg with her breast but leaves it occasionally to find food. The young Gygis may, during mother's absence, break out of the shell to find itself alone, teetering on a precarious twig.

P:The unicorn of fable was a fierce, creature with the head and body of a horse, the hind legs of an antelope, the tail of a lion or horse, a long sharp horn growing from its forehead. In the Authorized Version of the Old Testament unicorns are mentioned four times; in the Revised Version the Hebrew word, R'em, is translated "wild ox." During the Middle Ages the belief was prevalent that the savage unicorn was soothed by the sight of a virgin, would approach softly and lay his head in a true virgin's lap. Though this notion gave rise to no little scandal, no one managed to trap the elusive beast by virgins or otherwise. A bit of unicorn horn ground to powder was regarded by a medieval physician as the most potent remedy he could administer, but because undisputed horns turned up so rarely the price ranged from $12,000 to $150,000.

In 1590 the religious of a Spanish monastery presented a unicorn horn in a handsome leather case to the new Pope, Gregory XIV, who was in feeble health. Next year the Pope sank so alarmingly that it was gravely decided to administer the powdered tip of the horn. Despite this strong medicine, or perhaps because of it, the Pope died. In 1909 the horn, minus tip and plus a few worm holes, was brought to light and sold to a man in Rome, who later sold it to a U. S. collector, who still later gave it to Manhattan's American Museum. There last week Pope Gregory's unicorn horn was on exhibition. It was placed in the Hall of South Asiatic Mammals, because it was identified as having once adorned the snout of an Indian rhinoceros.

P:One day last week in Chicago's Field Museum of Natural History an exultant message sped by telephone from the anthropology laboratories to the administrative offices:

"I've found a quipu!"

When the Museum's Director Stephen Chapman Simms heard that, he hastened upstairs to find Assistant Curator J. Eric Thompson of Central & South American Archeology brandishing a cluster of knotted strings. Few of the world's museums have even one quipu, and probably none has more than two. A quipu is a long cord, made of plant fibre, to which are tied other cords. The ancient inhabitants of Peru used them to count population, military reinforcements, llama flocks. Knots in the dependent cords represent units of 100, 10 and 1, depending on position. "An expedition might spend months working in Peru," exulted Director Simms, "without finding a trace of one."

Dr. Thompson found the quipu in a basket of weaving materials included in a collection purchased ten years ago. As the Museum then boasted no expert on Peruvian archeology, the collection was stored. Lately Dr. Thompson has been combing it for exhibition items. He announced he would try to ascertain what this particular quipu was used for, began with a guess that it might have belonged to an oldtime sorcerer who employed it in horoscope-casting.

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