30 CARNEGIE INSTITUTION OF WASHINGTON. 



The variety and extent of the work carried on by Research 



Associates and collaborators has led to the widely spread but 



erroneous notion that the Institution has entered, 



Work of Research -i i r* i i c • 



Associates and or IS able to cntcr, all possible nelds or investiga- 

 tion, and that an expert can be supplied offhand 

 for immediate consideration of any question which the world may 

 submit. But while such comprehensive capacity is obviously 

 unattainable b}' finite means, or by any single establishment, the 

 scope and ramifications of this work are such as to defy adequate 

 condensation and exposition within the limits of an administra- 

 tive report. To understand this branch of the Institution's 

 activities one must at least read the titles of the reports and the 

 l)ui3lications which appear in the current Year Book and know 

 something of the contributing authors and their environments. 

 Summarily it may be stated that more than a hundred indi- 

 viduals have been engaged in these activities during the past 

 3Tar and that their work embraces a range of about thirty differ- 

 ent subjects of research. Although attempts to draw lines of 

 distinction between adjacent fields of advancing knowledge are 

 alike futile and inimical to progress, it may be of interest to note 

 with respect to these subjects that if they be classified under the 

 two categories of descriptive sciences and mathematico-physical 

 sciences, respectively, they will be found to be about evenly 

 divided. It may be noted also that in this work the so-called 

 ''humanities" represent no small share, since researches have 

 been promoted during the past year in Roman archeology, in 

 Central American archeology, in Roman paleography, in history, 

 in law, in linguistics and in several branches of literature. But 

 in all this latter work the object has been not to fix, nor to accept, 

 categories, nor to determine ''shares," but to produce results of 

 permanent value. 



Referring to the individual reports and to the bibliographic 

 lists in the current Year Book for accounts of the investigations 

 and of the publications of the year in this highly diversified 

 branch of the Institution's work, it must suffice here to cite a few 

 salient facts indicative of progress. Thus, Dr. Van Deman, in 

 her studies of Roman archeology, has developed criteria for 



