REPORT OF THE PRESIDENT, I907. 25 



One of the first necessities which confronted this department was that of a 

 systematic search for early as well as recent economic material in the official 

 documents of the several States of the United States. To meet this need the 

 preparation of a classified index of economic material in the State documents 

 has been undertaken for the department by Miss Adelaide Hasse, of the New 

 York Public Library. Three volumes of this important work, namely, those 

 for the States of Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont, have been issued by 

 the Institution during the past year, and volumes for New York and Rhode 

 Island are now in press. 



The work of this department is progressing favorably along lines ex- 

 plained in preceding reports, the principal problems under investigation being 

 those of heredity in plants and animals. Old as these 

 mentd^EvoIution!*^'" Problems are, it is only recently that their study has risen 

 to the level of the older physical sciences in which meas- 

 urement and calculation are so advantageously applied. It is now clear, 

 however, that these powerful adjuncts of research may be applied with equal 

 advantage in biological investigations. Thus the more important work of 

 our Departments of Experimental Evolution, Botanical Research, and Marine 

 Biology serves to mark the advance of biological science from the qualitative 

 to the quantitative stage. 



One of the most interesting and gratifying results flowing from the larger 

 projects undertaken by the Institution is the stimulus they are producing 

 amongst individual investigators at home and abroad. This is especially the 

 case with the Department of Experimental Evolution, whose location close 

 to the main routes of travel makes inspection of its work somewhat more 

 easy than in the case of other departments. The reciprocal advantages 

 arising from visits to our departments of experts in similar lines of work are 

 of the highest significance. Indeed, it appears not improbable that the in- 

 direct results arising from such conferences may prove to be in the aggregate 

 of as great value in the advancement of knowledge as the direct results of 

 departmental investigations. 



The completion and occupancy of the Geophysical Laboratory mark a 

 noteworthy advance in the progress of the novel and difficult experimental 



work carried on in this department of research. This 

 '^ LaboStoJ""^ ^°^^ ^^^ started in a tentative way by Dr. Day, now 



Director of the laboratory, while he was a member of 

 the stafif of the U. S. Geological Survey. The results of his preliminary 

 investigations and the limited quarters available in the Survey building 

 rendered the construction of a special laboratory essential to adequate devel- 

 opment and prosecution of the work. Accordingly, as explained more fully 

 in my last report, provision was made by the Board of Trustees at their 

 meeting in December, 1905, for the purchase of a site and for the construe- 



