1S51.] 143 



I trust that I may be pardoned for suggesting that tlie prosperity of the 

 Academy might be still farther extended, if the system of introducing strangers 

 to the ordinary meetings were more general. A taste for the pursuit of science 

 mii^ht thus be cultivated, and the Society enlarged by some very excellent addi- 

 tions. 



During the year the By-Law^s have been amended as follows : Chapt. 6, Art. 1. 

 There shall be sixteen standing committees, (instead of fifteen, as before the 

 amendment) : so that the committee on mineralogy and geology be divided. 



Besides several minor communications, the following have been made during 

 the year. Four by Mr. John Cassin, entitled. Descriptions of new species of 

 birds, specimens of which are in the collection of the Acad. Nat. Sci. of Philadel- 

 phia, (6 species) published in Proceedings ; Descriptions of new species of birds 

 of the genera Paradisea, Pastor, and Buceros, and a proposition to rename others 

 of the genera Alcyone and Hirimdo, (5 species described) published in Proceed- 

 ings; Descriptions of new species of Birds collected by Mr. John G. Bell in Cali- 

 fornia, (7 species described) published in Proceedings ; Notice of an American 

 species of Duck hitherto regarded as identical with the Oidemia fusca, (Linn.) 

 published in Proceedings. One by Mr. T. A. Conrad, entitled, Descriptions of 

 new species of Fresh water Shells, (10 species) published in Proceedings. One 

 by Mr. James Deane, On the Fossil foot prints of Connecticut River, which was 

 published in the Journal. One by Dr. Lewis R. Gibbes, Catalogue of the Crus- 

 tacea in the Cabinet of A. N. S., with notes on the most remarkable, together 

 with Additions and Observations by the Committee to whom the foregoing was 

 referred, published in the Proceedings. One by S. S. Haldeman, Report on the pro- 

 gress of Entomology in the U. S. One by Mr. A. C. Harris, On the existence 

 of the Ibis religiosa on the Nile. One by Dr. T. C. Henry, of Albany, on two fishes 

 from Oswego Lake. Twelve by Dr. Joseph Leidy, as follows : Observations 

 and remarks on Entophyta in living animals and on the theory of generation ; 

 Observations accompanying numerous elaborate drawings of new entophyta in 

 animals ; Remarks on the existence of crystals within animal organic cells ; on 

 eight new American species of Annelida abranchia, (Journal) ; on new species of 

 Entophyta growing within animals, 3 species; describing two new species of 

 Infusorial Entozoa ; descriptions of some nematoid Entozoa infesting insects ; ob- 

 servations on two new genera of Mammalian fossils, Eucrotaphus Jacksoni, and 

 Archaeotherium Mortoni ; descriptions of three Filariae; on the nettling organs of 

 Hydra; descriptions of new genera of Vermes (6) ; on some bones of Rhinoceros 

 nebraskensis, &c., received from the Smithsonian Institute. Three by Dr. Mor- 

 ton, one very full communication (of which parts were made at various times) in 

 continuation of his paper on the size of the brain in the various races of man; on 

 the value of the word species in Zoology; on the antiquity of some races of dogs. 

 One by Theodore F. Moss, description of a new Carpolite from Arkansas. One 

 by Prof. David Dale Owen, and J. G. Norwood, and John Evans, notice of fossil 

 remains brought by Mr. Evans from the Mauvaises Terres or Bad Lands of 

 White River, 150 miles west of the Missouri, published in Journal. One by 

 Prof. David Dale Owen, and B. F. Shumard, M. D., description of ten new species 

 of Crinoidea from the subcarboniferous limestone of Iowa, Wisconsin, and Mine- 

 sota, 1848 9, (Journal). One by Mr. R. C. Taylor, Meteorological table and 

 notes on the climate on the east coast of the Isthmus of Panama, Port Royal in 

 Jamaica, and on the voyage to New York. One by Dr. J. K. Townsend, de- 



