REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1920. 73 



ArCKSSIONS IiESEnVIXG .SrECIAL XOTICE AXn WHY. 



The important accessions received dining the present year may, 

 on the Avhole, be characterized as being more or less supplemental 

 to our exotic collections. Thus while our African collections wei-e 

 previously confined chiefly to east Africa, the present year has added 

 more than 2,350 mammals, birds, reptiles, fishes and invertebrates 

 from West Africa, collected by Mr. Aschemeier during the Collins- 

 Garner Expedition, and at the same time Mr. Raven has sent about 

 250 mammals and birds from South Africa. Another of the more 

 important accessions, including about 500 specimens, represents the 

 first installment of Australian mammals, birds, reptiles, etc., col- 

 lected by Mr. Charles M. Hoy in Xew South AVales. This is the 

 first major collection of Australian vertebrates ever made especially 

 for the National Museum, and is of prime importance because the 

 indigenous Australian fauna is fast disappearing owing to the 

 thoughtless introduction of foreign predatory animals. 



Distributed among the vai'ious divisions or concerning them ex- 

 clusively the more important accessions are as folloAvs : 



Mammals. — The greatest accession was that of the Collins-Garner 

 collection from French Congo consisting of 695 specimens including 

 2 gorillas, 2 chimpanzees, 2 buffaloes, 5 pigs, and 27 antelopes. The 

 240 Australian specimens, collected by Mr. Hoy form another ex- 

 tremely important addition from a region from which we had hith- 

 erto almost no material. From southern Africa 113 mammals were 

 received, collected by Mr. H. C. Eaven of the Smithsonian African 

 Expedition, which will be of great value for comparison with our 

 Flast African material now being reported on by Mr. Hollister. Thir- 

 ty-one mammals collected by Dr. W. L. Abbott in Santo Domingo are 

 of considerable importance, as they include two solenodons and mate- 

 lial from shell heaps. Mr. E. C. Chubb of the Durban Museum, 

 Xatal, South Africa, presented the Museum with 2 small rodents, one 

 of them the exceedingly rare Petromys^ hitherto unrepresented in the 

 Museum. The skull of a beaked whale from Florida donated by Mr. 

 Charles Ericsson, Hallandale, Florida, also deserves mention, as such 

 material is highly desirable. 



Birds. — The 679 specimens collected by Mr. Aschemeier in French 

 Congo have as yet been determined only partly, but enough have been 

 identified to make it safe to say that the collection contains a large 

 ji.umber of genera and species neAv to the Museum, among them such 

 genera as Tlh/ianfoniis, an unusual type of rail; Pteronetta, a rare 

 duck, of which but few samples exist in museums; Tigriornis, a 

 heron, and CaJopeJIa, a pigeon, both rare; la'onotiis, a genus of bul- 

 buls hitherto unrepresented in the Museum, although known since 

 1851, etc. The Santo Domingo material collected by Dr. W. L. 



