REPORT OF ASSISTANT SECRETARY. 19 
matic loading devices. Separate chambers in the stock carry a supply 
of loose powder and bullets, and these are fed into the barrel by a 
single movement of a simple lever, which at the same time closes the 
pan and cocks the hammer of the flintlock. This relic was discovered 
in Baltimore, Maryland, in 1863, by a provost-marshal and held in the 
custody of the Government until after the close of the war, when it 
was sold to a local dealer, finally passing into the possession of the 
Cartridge Company. 
Three interesting pieces have also been added to the collection of 
arms through the courtesy of the War Department. One is a Spring- 
field musket made in 1800, being the immediate successor of the 
Charleville model, of which a number of examples were sent to this 
country by the Government of France just before the war of the Revo- 
lution. The Charleville model was employed by the French army and 
was regarded as the most effective military gun of its time; it was used 
during a considerable period by the ordnance officers of the United 
States Army as a pattern for making guns at the Springfield Arsenal, 
slight improvements being introduced from time to time. The other 
two are United States magazine rifles of the model of 1903, with 
improvements of 1905, including the knife bayonet. 
The coilection of aeroplanes has received several important pieces. 
One of these was an example of the so-called air sailer, having no pro- 
pelling power, but used to support a man in flight from some elevated 
point to the ground, constructed and used by Otto Lilienthal, a noted 
German experimenter in this subject, which was presented to the 
Museum by Mr. John Brisben Walker. - Another was one of the flying 
machines invented by Mr. Lawrence Hargrave, of New South Wales, 
and donated by the Field Museum of Natural History of Chicago. 
This example is provided with propellers driven by a compressed-air 
engine placed near the forward end of a central tubular shaft, the 
latter serving as the compressed-air reservoir, and was tested by Mr. 
Hargrave in 1891, when it made a flight of 312 feet. Mr. Octave 
Chanute, of Chicago, so well known for his experiments in aerodromics, 
has very generously given to the Museum a number of small models 
and parts of apparatus of his own devising, which are of much histor- 
ical interest. 
The collection of American watch movements has been enriched by 
several interesting additions, illustrating advancing steps in the indus- 
try. Asaloan from Mr. Frederick Leach, of New York, there were 
received a movement made by Dennison, Howard & Davis, at Wal- 
tham, Mass., before the organization of the American Waltham Com- 
pany, and forming a basis for the work done immediately afterwards; 
one of the first stem-winding lady’s watches; a collection of typical 
watch movements made in the United States at an early date, and one 
