Director'' s Annual Report. 9 



the retirement of Messrs Thompson and Seale. This interruption 

 of Mr. Thompson's admirable series of casts of Hawaiian fishes is 

 greatly to be regretted, and it is the hope of all the staff that he 

 may soon be enabled to resume his most valuable work. The other 

 members remain as before and have been doing excellent work, 

 but owing to the lack of funds this work has generally been con- 

 fined to the preservation of what is already in the Museum rather 

 than to increasing the colle(5tions. 



Even in the Printing Department we have little to show for a 

 year of hard work ; only the Report for 1903 has been published. 

 Owing to unexpedted delays, for which the printer was not respon- 

 sible, the printing of the memoir on Mat and Basket work of the old 

 Hawaiians has not been completed. The compendium of the origi- 

 nal descriptions of the species of Achatinella has suffered from the 

 general dela}-, and it seems doubtful if it can be issued before the 

 end of the j^ear 1905. Several other works are read}- for the press, 

 but the time of their publication cannot now be announced. 



During the year the large and valuable collecSlion of Hawaiian 

 bird skins made by Professor H. W. Henshaw has been purchased, 

 and thus many rare and exceeding valuable specimens have come 

 to the Museum. Gould's Birds of New Guinea has been added to 

 the Library. The Menage colledlion of Philippine birds has been 

 deposited in this Museum where it is accessible to students, and 

 Mr. W. A. Bryan has the description well in hand. Mr. Bryan 

 has also prepared two fine groups of albatrosses, Dio^nedea nigripes 

 and D. immutabiUs . A figure of the latter group is here presented. 



The Diredlor, during his vacation in New Zealand and Aus- 

 tralia, coUecfted man}- rare and valuable implements, as will be 

 seen in the list of accessions below. Among these is a bark canoe 

 from northern Australia, which seems to differ from others figured 

 and described, and seems worthy of illustration. 



The collecftion of corals from Oahu and Molokai made by 



Messrs. Stokes and Cooke is a notable one, containing new species 



[201] 



