in zoology, Dr. W. L. Abbott, of Philadephia; in botany, Capt. John Donnell Smith, of Baltimore; in mineralogy, Rev. L. T. Chamberlain, of New York City; in paleobotany, Prof. Lester F. Ward, of Washington.

Additions to the collections. The principal source of accessions during the past year was the Louisiana Purchase Exposition. The exhibition made in that connection by the Museum itself contained many important objects acquired through the Government appropriation for the exposition, which, excepting such as were sent to the Lewis and Clark Exposition, were subsequently incorporated in the public series here. Much more extensive and noteworthy, however, were the gifts made to the national collections by several foreign governments, by many States of the Union, and by a large number of individuals having exhibits at St. Louis. So extensive, in fact, were these contributions that they amounted in bulk to about 30 carloads of specimens, besides five of exhibition cases. Of this number 25 cars were filled with collections illustrative of mineral technology alone, comprising examples of the natural and finished products and of the appliances of manufacture in many branches of mineral industry. Unfortunately the arrangement and display of this instructive material must be deferred until more space becomes available through the completion of the new building. The Department of Geology also received many important additions, especially in the way of large masses and pieces appropriate for exhibition. The contributions in ethnology, next in extent to those in mineral technology, were exceedingly varied and interesting, since they relate to the customs and industries of several peoples, and will richly supplement the existing collections.

Through the accessions already noted, the total number of specimens in the Museum has been increased to about 6,141,990, classified as follows: Anthropology, 986,964; biology, 4,409,135; geology, 745,891.

The most noteworthy additions in ethnology, besides those obtained at St. Louis, were from the several islands between Sumatra and Borneo, the Mergui Archipelago, and the island of Mindanao of the Philippine group; from pueblos, cliff houses, and caves in western Socorro County, New Mexico; and from the Apache and Pima Indians of Arizona, and the pueblo of Zuni. To the collections in physical anthropology was added a large amount of material bearing upon the natural history of several races of man, especially the American Indians, Negroes, Slavs, and Filipinos.

The most important acquisitions in historic archeology consisted of Arabic manuscripts and prints from the Moros of Mindanao, and of coins, pottery lamps, and jars from the Orient. The Division of Prehistoric Archeology obtained two valuable collections of implements from Japan; many interesting specimens from Australia and Tasmania, Cape Colony, Thuringia (Germany), and Belmonti, Italy; and a large number of stone implements and pottery from the United States, Mexico, and South America.

The collection of timekeeping devices was increased by several gifts and loans, and acknowledgments are due to the War Department for depositing numerous pieces of ordnance, among them being many of considerable historic interest.

The Division of Graphic Arts received many contributions from foreign exhibitors at the Louisiana Purchase Exposition, and two pictures taken by Daguerre. Among the accessions in ceramics were an extensive and very beautiful collection of glassware from the Union Glass Works; examples of Teco ware and Van Briggle pottery, and a collection of typical Japanese and Chinese porcelains and pottery and of Japanese lacquer work.

To the collection of American history were added 768 objects, mostly loans.

including many personal military relics and examples of the wearing apparel and other articles of the colonial period in Maryland and New York.

Mention may here be made of the large oil portrait of the Empress Dowager of China, painted by Miss Katherine A. Carl and presented to the United States by the Government of China, with appropriate ceremonies at the White House. The picture, encased in its heavy and elaborately carved frame of camphor wood, was transferred directly to the custody of the Museum and temporarily installed in the lecture hall.

About 217,538 specimens were acquired by the Department of Biology, the principal increases as regards number of specimens being in the divisions of Plants, Insects, and Mollusks, though in other branches the additions were not less important. The Division of Mammals received large collections containing many novelties from Malaysia and the Philippine Islands, besides many interesting specimens from southern Europe, Brazil, and Japan, the Kamerun district of West Africa, and Bewean Island in the Java Sea. The most important additions to the Division of Birds were from the Philippine Islands, Malaysia, and Costa Rica. Of reptiles, collections were obtained from Japan, Formosa, the Philippine Islands, Malaysia, China, France, Switzerland, Jamaica, Guatemala, and several parts of the United States. The Division of Fishes received by transfer from the United States Bureau of Fisheries type collections from Samoan waters and Hawaii, and a very large number of specimens from the Pacific and Atlantic coasts of North America.

The Bureau of Fisheries was also the largest single contributor to the Division of Mollusks, having transferred some 5,000 specimens from recent dredgings of the steamer Albatross on the coast of California. Other important accessions comprised land and fresh-water shells from Texas, California, and Montana; about 1,500 identified specimens of Philippine shells from the collection of the late Herr Mollendorff, and many marine mollusks from Alaska. While no single large collection was received by the Division of Insects, yet as a whole the additions were of average importance, aggregating over 34,000 specimens from many parts of the world.

The Division of Marine Invertebrates obtained from the Bureau of Fisheries 300 lots of foraminifera from the region about the Hawaiian Islands and a large collection of crustaceans and samples of ocean bottom from the Albatross cruise of the winter of 1904-5 in the eastern part of the Central Pacific. The most important additions to the Helminthological Collection was a series of parasites from Egypt.

The past year has been especially noteworthy as regards the increase of the collection in the Division of Plants, the additions having been very much greater than in any previous year in the history of the Museum, embracing 750 accessions and 143,690 specimens. This was chiefly owing to the generous gift by Capt. John Donnell Smith, of Baltimore, of his entire private herbarium, which alone contained 100.889 specimens from different regions, but mainly from tropical America. This large and valuable donation, the work of many years in assembling, was accompanied by a choice botanical library of over 1,500 volumes. The next important contribution was by transfer from the United States Department of Agriculture of 13,965 specimens from many parts of the United States, and from Alaska, Greenland, Canada, Mexico, Guatemala, Europe, and India.

The Department of Geology acquired by gift at the Louisiana Purchase Exposition important series of ores, minerals, and economic products from Brazil, Siam, Ceylon, Greece, and several of the States, and through other sources, many interesting minerals and cut gems.

The collections in Stratigraphic Paleontology were mainly increased through transfers from the Geological Survey, of which the principal ones consisted of large numbers of Niagaran fossils from Tennessee, of Ordovician fossils from the slates at Arvonia, Va., and of Devonian and Carboniferous fossils from Colorado. A very valuable acquisition was the gift by Mr. E. O. Ulrich and Dr. R. S. Bassler of the type and figured specimens of 65 species. The Section of Vertebrate Paleontology received two large collections from the Geological Survey, one made in the Wasatch Eocene of the Big Horn basin, Wyoming, the other from the Oligocene of Oelrichs, S. Dak. In Paleobotany, the most important additions were about 400 specimens from the coal fields of São Paulo and Santa Catharina, Brazil, and about the same number from the higher beds of the anthracite series in the vicinity of Pottsville, Pa.

Explorations.-As custodian of the national collections, the Museum depends chiefly for its increment upon the Government explorations conducted by such establishments as the Geological Survey, the Bureau of Fisheries, several of the bureaus of the Department of Agriculture charged with biological research, and the Bureau of American Ethnology, though in the history of the Museum both the Army and Navy have figured conspicuously. The very limited means available for the purpose prevents any extended amount of field work by members of the Museum staff.

From October, 1904, to March, 1905, the steamer Albatross, of the Bureau of Fisheries, made extensive explorations in the eastern part of the Central Pacific Ocean, under the scientific direction of Dr. Alexander Agassiz. For the Bureau of American Ethnology Dr. J. Walter Fowkes investigated the sites of ancient Totonac semicivilization in southern Mexico, and Mrs. Matilda Coxe Stevenson continued her studies among the Zuni Indians of New Mexico, both of these expeditions being productive of important collections. Mr. E. A. Schwarz, who visited Cuba for the Department of Agriculture, brought back a large collection of insects which is especially rich in Coleoptera. Mr. A. G. Maddren, under a grant from the Smithsonian Institution, made a reconnoissance of a part of the Yukon River basin of Alaska, during which he secured fragmentary remains of several interesting Pleistocene mammals.

Reference should also be made to the movements of two of the most generous benefactors of the Museum, Dr. W. L. Abbott and Maj. Edgar A. Mearns, surgeon, U. S. Army, from both of whom important contributions were received during the year. The former, with headquarters at Singapore, has recently been working in the Mergui Archipelago and on the islands of Banka, Billiton, and Karimata, where his detailed and painstaking inquiries have furnished most important results in both zoology and ethnology; the latter, who was with the army of Maj. Gen. Leonard Wood on the island of Mindanao, has collected in the same lines and with the same care.

Of field work conducted by assistants of the Museum, the following may be mentioned: Dr. Alés Hrdlička, during his investigations among the Apaches and Pimas of Arizona in the spring of 1905, obtained an important series of ethnological specimens, and Dr. Frederick W. True made several short trips to near-by places in Maryland and Virginia for the purpose of securing remains of the cetaceans which occurred in this region during the Cretaceous period. Dr. Leonhard Stejneger and Mr. Gerrit S. Miller, jr., collected animals and plants in Switzerland, France, and Italy during the summer of 1904. Mr. Robert Ridgway, who was in Costa Rica from November, 1904, to June, 1905, obtained a large series of the birds of that country, and was instrumental in securing a most important donation from the national museum at San José. Dr. W. L. Ralph visited the Dismal Swamp, Virginia, and the Adirondack region of New York, while Mr. Barton A. Bean collected in Carroll County, western Maryland.

Dr. F. V. Coville, while engaged in field work for the Department of Agriculture in Texas, Arizona, and New Mexico, obtained many plants which have since been transferred to the Museum, and Prof. O. F. Cook made botanical collections in Guatemala. Mr. W. R. Maxon was in Jamaica during the first part of the year, and later, accompanied by Mr. Robert Hay, in Guatemala under detail to the Department of Agriculture. In June, 1905, Dr. J. N. Rose, with Mr. Joseph H. Painter, left on a collecting trip to Mexico, which will be continued during the summer.

The Department of Geology was enriched from several localities through cooperative work with the United States Geological Survey, participated in by Dr. George P. Merrill, and Dr. R. S. Bassler; and in June Mr. Charles W. Gilmore accompanied one of the field parties of the Survey to New Mexico, where he obtained a small but interesting series of fossil vertebrates.

Researches. The classified arrangement of the collections prescribed by law calls for a large amount of research work in the study and naming of specimens, although a greater or less proportion of the material received has already been identified. A full compliance with this requirement has at no time been possible, since the attention of the scientific staff on its past and present basis has been mainly absorbed in the mere care and preservation of the collections, and the maintenance of the exhibition features. Much help is obtained, however, from the scientific men of other institutions, many of whom are interested in one or other of the subjects represented in the Museum, and they may visit Washington or have collections sent to them for the purposes of investigation. The results of most of the inquiries conducted in the Museum laboratories are only indicated in the manuscript records, which are virtually a descriptive history of the national collections, constantly in progress, but the working up of a collection from any particular locality or region, or of a group of objects, large or small, may lead to a positive contribution to knowledge, meriting dissemination through the medium of publication. Some of the more important investigations of the past year, both by assistants of the Museum and by others, have been as follows:

In the Department of Anthropology, Dr. Walter Hough began a detailed study of the very extensive Pueblo collections, continued his observations upon the primitive uses of fire, and nearly completed a report on the Hopi Indians of Arizona. The collections in archeology were utilized by Mr. W. H. Holmes in preparing subjects and illustrations for the Handbook of North American Indians and by Dr. J. W. Fewkes in working up the results of his recent archeological explorations in the Antillian region. Several lines of research in physical anthropology occupied the attention of Dr. Alés Hrdlička, and a paper descriptive of the Howland loan collection of Buddhist religious art was written by Dr. I. M. Casanowicz.

In the Department of Biology, Dr. F. W. True prepared a diagnosis of the fossil skull of a new genus and species of sea lion from Oregon and began a report on the collection of ziphioid whales in the Museum. Mr. Gerrit S. Miller, jr., spent several months at the natural history museums of London, Paris, Berlin, and Leiden in completing his studies and identifications of the very extensive East Indian collection of mammals belonging to the National Museum and of material from other regions. Dr. E. A. Mearns, while in Washington during the winter, studied and described the unique collection of mammals and birds which he brought from the Philippines and completed the first part of his report on the mammals obtained in connection with the Mexican boundary survey.

Mr. Robert Ridgway continued the preparation of his monograph on the birds of North and Middle America. The birds obtained by Dr. W. L. Abbott

on the islands off the west coast of Sumatra were the subject of study by Dr. Charles H. Richmond, and those secured by the same explorer in Kilimanjaro and the China Sea by Mr. H. C. Oberholser, of the Biological Survey. Mr. J. H. Riley reported on a collection from the islands of Antigua and Barbuda. Mr. Barton A. Bean, in conjunction with Dr. C. H. Eigenmann, of Indiana University, worked up the specimens of fishes brought from the Amazon River by Prof. J. B. Steere in 1901. The Characinidæ have been referred to Doctor Eigenmann, and the Pacific deep-sea fishes are being studied by Dr. C. H. Gilbert, of Leland Stanford Junior University.

on the

Dr. W. H. Dall completed a revision of the land and fresh-water mollusks of North America north of latitude 49°, a review of the classification of the American Cyclostomatidæ, and papers on land and fresh-water shells from the Bahamas and Central America. He also has in progress reports Pyramidellida, in joint authorship with Dr. Paul Bartsch; and on recent collections from the Bureau of Fisheries. Dr. William H. Ashmead has about completed his work on the superfamily Fornticoidea or ants, and Mr. D. W. Coquillett has been engaged upon a monograph of the North American mosquitoes. Miss M. J. Rathbun prepared for the Bureau of Fisheries two reports on Brachyura and Macrura, collected at the Hawaiian Islands and in Alaska, and continued her studies on the fresh-water crabs. Dr. Harriet Richardson completed a comprehensive monograph of the North American Isopods, and Dr. T. Wayland Vaughan gave much time to the madreporarian corals.

Dr. J. N. Rose reports satisfactory progress with his researches on the flora of Mexico and on the Crassulaceæ and Cactaceae of North America. Mr. William R. Maxon prepared several papers on ferns, and Mr. J. H. Painter studied the Mexican species of Meibomia. Capt. John Donnell Smith, associate in botany, continued his investigations and the printing of his extensive work, and Dr. E. L. Greene, under a grant from the Smithsonian Institution, began upon an important paper to be entitled “Landmarks of Botanical History."

Dr. George P. Merrill completed a contribution to a history of American geology and conducted observations on the origin of asbestiform serpentine and the weathering of building stones. Research work in mineralogy was mainly confined to the study of the structure of meteorites by Mr. Wirt Tassin. Dr. R. S. Bassler submitted a paper on the Bryozoa of the Rochester Shales. The report of Dr. Anton Handlirsch, of Vienna, on the Paleozoic insects represented in the Museum collection was received during the year and will soon be published. An important work, sent to press before the close of the year, was a catalogue of the type specimens of fossil invertebrates contained in the collections of the Museum.

In Paleobotany, Prof. Lester F. Ward completed the second part of his monograph on the status of the Mesozoic floras of the United States. Mr. David White has made extensive use of the Lacoe collection in the preparation of a report on the stratigraphic succession of the Pottsville floras in the basins of the Appalachian trough, while Dr. F. H. Knowlton has been engaged upon the flora of the Laramie group and in the study of material from Alaska.

Distribution and exchange of duplicate specimens.-Duplicate invertebrate fossils to the number of some 60,000 specimens, gradually segregated from the reserve series during the progress of researches, were prepared for the use of educational institutions, being made up into several hundred sets. There also remained on hand for the same purpose a few sets of fishes, marine invertebrate animals, and geological specimens illustrating rock weathering and soil formation. Of these several collections, which are recognized as very helpful