EEPORT OF THE SECRETARY. 29 



existed only in the form of these short-hand notes. As the usefulness of 

 the work and especially its completeness depended largely on the com- 

 prehension of these notes, search was made, for a long time unsuccess- 

 fully, for some one able to decipher them. At last an old classmate and 

 personal friend of Dr. Carpenter, Mr. R. D. Darbishire, of Manchester, 

 England, undertook the task, with the assistance of the Rev. W. II. Her- 

 ford. To the knowledge of the short-hand possessed by Mr. Darbishire 

 (one of the few living persons who can read it) and to his generous willing- 

 ness to devote his time to the wearisome duty for the benefit of science 

 and out of regard for Dr. Carpenter's memory we are very greatly in- 

 debted and owe the translation of the above-mentioned notes. Mr. 

 Darbishire declined any remuneration for his services, and the labor be- 

 stowed by Mr. Herford was quite beyond the value of any honorarium 

 which the Institution was able to make him. The thanks of the Institu- 

 tion and of men of science generally are therefore due to these gentle- 

 men. The illustrations for the monograph, which are quite numerous, are 

 yet to be engraved, though they have already been beautifully drawn by 

 Mr. Emerton, under Dr. Carpenter's direction, at the cost of the Institu- 

 tion. This and a not inconsiderable amount of editing, which has been in- 

 trusted to Mr. W. H. Dall, remain to be accomplished before the mono- 

 graph will be ready for publication, a task which cannot be wholly com- 

 pleted under a year or two. 



List of zoological genera. — Among the works offered to the Smithsonian 

 Institution for x>ublication is a list of the zoological genera, giving the 

 time of publication and the class of the animal kingdom referred to. 

 Such works, if properly executed, are of great value to the investigator, 

 since, although imposing an immense labor upon the compiler, they ena- 

 ble the student to at once determine points of synonym} 7 and priority of 

 date; also whether a name proposed for a new genus has already been 

 used, thus sparing an enormous aggregate of individual effort. This 

 work, by Mr. Samuel n. Scudder, of Cambridge, will probably be com- 

 pleted and published in the course of the year 18S0. 



Bulletins of the National Museum. — In the Secretary's Report for 1875 

 it was stated that another series of publications, which would form a 

 part of the Miscellaneous Collections, had been commenced under the 

 above title. This series is intended to illustrate the collections of natural 

 history and ethnology belonging to the United States, and constituting 

 the stock of the National Museum, of which the Smithsonian Institution 

 is the custodian. These bulletins, prepared at the request and mainly 

 by the attaches of the Institution, have been printed under the authority 

 of the Secretary of the Interior. They form an independent series, 

 which has proved very acceptable to naturalists, as enabling them to 

 obtain prompt information as to the additions to and the components 

 of the National Museum. 



The following is a list of the titles and contents of the bulletins already 

 published: 



