428 PROCEEDINGS OF THE ACADEMY OF [1887. 



The proposition has been urged by several members that a section 

 be formed especially devoted to these studies. If the time is not 

 already ripe for this, it undoubtedly will be soon. 



In my last report, the attention of the Academy was called to the 

 insufficient accommodations now provided for the Arch geological 

 and Ethnological collections of the Academy, and a resolution was 

 passed asking more specific statements on this point. The facts are 

 these : The present collection is scattered throughout the building, 

 portions of it being in every room where there are any collections 

 at all. Many of the objects are crowded together in space too re- 

 stricted to allow of their proper display. Many have to be stored 

 away in drawers or closed cases where the public or even students 

 can derive no advantage from them whatever. It has been found 

 impossible to arrange them in any satisfactory manner. In order to 

 accomplish this a much larger space should be assigned this branch 

 than it now occupies, and all the objects properly belonging to it 

 should be collected and disposed in the most illustrative manner. 

 The plan of such an arrangement should be distinctly the Ethnolog- 

 ical plan, not that adopted in the National Museum at Washington, 

 which for scientific purposes is the worst conceivable. 



A great advantage which such increased space and scientific dis- 

 play would have would be to render manifest in what departments 

 of anthropology the Academy is deficient, and would stimulate 

 members and their friends to su2:)ply such deficiencies. This would 

 not be difficult to accomplish. On several occasions gentlemen 

 have offered excellent collections either for gift or for deposit in the 

 Academy, provided we could give them fair space for display. I 

 have felt obliged to decline such offers as I knew that with the space 

 at my command it was not possible to satisfy the reasonable expec- 

 tations of the donors. 



The additions during the year to the department under my charge 

 have neither been numerous nor specially important, the most note- 

 worthy being a collection of Peruvian mummies and crania, pre- 

 sented by Messrs. G. Y. and W. H. McCracken. 



Respectfully submittrd, 



D. G. Brikton, 

 Professor of Ethnology and Arehceology. 



