6 Director'' s Amnial Report. 



walled up in a branch of a cave on Hawaii. These are so inter- 

 esting that I have thought best to fully describe them in an 

 appendix to this report, especially as they are at present in private 

 hands and of course liable to injur}' or destrucftion by fire. It is 

 greatly to be hoped that this, the most interesting find hitherto 

 recorded, may eventually come into the possession of this Museum. 



In the department of Ichthyology the collecflion of wet speci- 

 mens has been carefully examined and the portion from the south- 

 east Pacific been compared with the catalogue and placed in jars. 

 The description of such of these as are new has been prepared by 

 Mr. Seale, formerly collector for this Museum, and his manuscript 

 has been carefully revised by Dr. David Starr Jordan, and arranged 

 by Mr. W. A. Bryan and is now in type. The fine colledlion of 

 painted casts has been identified and labelled. Among these casts 

 were found several new species which have been described by Mr. 

 Bryan, and the descriptions and figures are appended to this report. 

 Comparison with the series of colored plates in the new report of the 

 United States Fish Commission on the Hawaiian Fishes, shows that 

 we have nearly all the fish there represented in our series of casts. 



In the department of Ornithology the Henshaw collecftion has 

 been catalogued and placed in suitable boxes. A group of Hawaii- 

 an shore birds has been placed on exhibition, and another large 

 group of birds has been partly prepared. The collection of nests 

 and eggs, already a large one, has been somewhat increased. 



In the department of Couchology the Garrett collecftion has 

 been partly relabelled in accordance with Dr. Dall's identification, 

 and has also been rearranged to accord with the new system — a 

 change involving great labor, as some ten thousand cards on which 

 the shells are mounted had to be readjusted to the drawers. Dr. 

 Cooke has continued his work on the land shells, and was given 

 leave of absence during the latter half of the year to visit the de- 

 positaries of type specimens of our Pulmonata in America and 

 abroad. He is still engaged in this very important work with 



gratifying success. 



[260] 



