4 REPORT OF 



and his valuable donation of Siberian and Ouralian Minerals, 

 joined to the fine Metereolite from L'Aigle, given by Mr. Los- 

 combe, and several select specimens from Mr. Dahby, the 

 Rev. Stephen Creyke, Dr. Wasse, Mrs. Thorpe, and others, 

 has left few very obvious chasms in the series of mineral 

 substances. 



In Zoology, a very instructive donation has been received 

 from the Rev. Christopher Sykes, in the perfect skeleton, 28 

 feet long, of Balcena rostrata, which was drifted to the coast 

 of Holderness in 1828, and then minutely examined and care- 

 fully prepared for the Museum by the donor and Mr. Phillips. 



The collection of Birds, enriched with beautiful East Indian 

 specimens through the attention of Dr. Wake, i and with 

 Brazilian and other foreign kinds by Lady Howden, Mr. 

 White, and Mr. Marshall, is likewise indebted for several 

 interesting British Birds to other Members of the Society. 

 Every department of Zoological science has received some 

 useful illustrations, and through the continued benefactions of 

 Mr. Danby, Mr. Marshall, and Mr. White, the series of 

 shells, insects, and corals, have been made much more in- 

 structive. 



The Council must again call the attention of the Society to 

 the ingenious and useful labours of one of the Members, who 

 has not only adorned the Museum by a further deposit of the 

 skeletons of Birds, which afford such striking evidence of well- 

 directed scientific zeal; but has, moreover, at his own cost, 

 furnished the temporary cases for exhibiting them. To illus- 

 trate the various and beautiful adaptations of the bony struc- 

 ture of birds by complete skeletons of the most characteristic 



« Presented by Dr. Wake^ on behalf of the donors^ Captain Murray, 

 and Ensign Wake. 



