REPORT OF NATIONAL, MUSEUM, 1919. 77 



logical Survey. One weasel skin and skull were abo loaned to the 

 Provincial Museum, Halifax, Nova Scotia, while seven samples of 

 mammal hairs were sent to Mr. Leon Augustus Ilausman, of Cornell 

 University. 



Birds. — Dr. W. L. Abbott, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, con- 

 tributed 952 skins, 87 alcoholics and skeletons, and 10 eggs. The 

 bulk of this material was collected in middle Celebes by Mr. H. C. 

 Eaven, and constitutes an important addition to the collection. It 

 contains representatives of 2 genera and 13 species (and subspecies) 

 new to science, descriptions of which have lately appeared. Doctor 

 Abbott personally collected 68 skins, 16 alcoholics and skeletons, and 

 10 eggs in Santo Domingo. Familiar with the desiderata of the 

 Museum, he went there for the purpose of filling gaps in the collec- 

 tion, and managed to obtain several desirable species and plumages. 

 Probably the most interesting item in this collection was a clutch, 

 of 4 eggs of the palm chat, possibly the first to reach any museum, 

 though the species, its nest, and general habits, have been known 

 ahnost since the discovery of America. The palm chat is very com- 

 mon on the island, conspicuous, lives in colonies, and builds an enor- 

 mous community nest, sometimes 5 feet or more in diameter, of small 

 sticks, placed in the top of a high palm tree. The eggs were de- 

 scribed by a French writer in 1851 as white, but they proved to be 

 spotted, and large for the size of the bird. Doctor Abbott also sent 

 2 eggs of the ruddy quail-dove {Oreofeleia montana)^ unusual in col- 

 lections. From Mr. B. H. Swales, honorary custodian of the sec- 

 tion of eggs, were received 645 birds, chiefly from North America, in- 

 cluding a number of important desiderata among foreign birds. 

 Among the latter were representatives of 28 genera not previously in 

 the Museum. There were also six sldns of a recently described new 

 diving petrel from the island of South Georgia. Large and im- 

 portant shipments of specimens of birds from the Collins-Garner 

 Congo expedition were received during the j^ear. The Bureau of 

 Fisheries transmitted two lots from Alaska, chiefly from the Pribilof 

 Islands, including 21 species not hitherto recorded from that group, 

 of which 4 were also unrecorded from North America. The latter 

 were the falcated teal {Eunetta falcata)^ Polynesian tattler {He- 

 teroscelus hrevipes), Kamchatkan sea eagle {Tludasoaetus pelagicus), 

 and Japanese pipit {Anthus spinoletta japonica). 



The Biological Survey, Department of Agriculture, transmitted 

 161 alcoholics and skeletons, chiefly birds of special interest, for 

 anatomical investigation. From the National Zoological Park were 

 received several accessions of consideral^le interest, namely, a trum- 

 peter swan, one of the fast-vanishing species of this country ; a crested 

 eagle from Liberia, a Cape Barren goose, and a weka rail. Mr. Ed- 



