430 PROCEEDINGS OF THE ACADEMY OF [1889. 



metropolis, the Academy has seen fit to prepare plans for the much- 

 needed new building, and it is expected that active work on the 

 structure will begin with the early part of the present winter. The 

 main portion of the contemplated new museum-building will be in 

 the form of an irregular square, fronting on 19th street 155 feet 

 and on Cherry street 130 feet, thus presenting a surface-area of 

 20,150 feet. Four tiers of galleries, each in the main, 32 feet 

 in width, will surround an open central hall, to which unbroken 

 illumination will be afforded by a tunnelled glass roof, springing at 

 a height of some 80 feet above the floor. Office and laboratory 

 rooms will be provided on the ground floor beneath the first gallery, 

 while a number of external preparation rooms will adjoin the build- 

 ing on the north side. A two-story building,, measuring 54 feet by 

 48, and furnishing a lecture-amphitheater designed to accommodate 

 650 persons, will unite the new structure with the edifice now occu- 

 pied by the Academy. With this separation of the two buildings 

 there will be little interference with the necessary illumination. 



The cost of the building, which will permit of some 67,000 square 

 feet of floor-surface available for museum purposes alone — not count- 

 ing here the offices and laboratories— is placed at $239,000. The 

 needs of the Academy make it imperative that this amount, together 

 with a further sum of $50-60,000 for cases, be secured, and it is 

 earnestly hoped that the best endeavors will be made to provide the 

 desired funds at as early a day as possible. All delay is now directly 

 hurtful to the institution, and to the interests to which the Academy 

 ministers. 



The collections of the Academy have been efficiently cared for 

 during the year, and the Curator-in-Charge is again obliged to ac- 

 knowledge his indebtedness to the numerous workers who have vol- 

 untarily or otherwise rendered their services to the Academy. The 

 Conservators of the Botanical, Conchological, Geological and 

 Entomological Sections may be specially mentioned in this connec- 

 tion ; likewise, the Conservator of the Wm. S. Vaux collections. 

 The ornithological department has profited largely through the labors 

 of Mr. Witmer Stone, who, apart from other work in connection with 

 classifying and arranging, has systematically applied himself to the 

 redetermination of the species of Falconidse, Vulturidse, Strigida?, 

 Corvidre, Paradiseidse, Oriolidae, Dicruridse, Campephagidse and 

 Muscicapidse. Three thousand four hundred specimens represent- 

 ing these families have been identified, numbered and catalogued 



