EEPORT OF THE SECRETARY. 59 



Institution has been in receipt of soundings taken by vessels of the 

 United States Navy in various parts of the world, and they have been 

 held in the hope of being able to make some definite arrangement for 

 disposing of them. As, however, there were no funds of the Smithson- 

 ian Institution or of the Xavy for meeting the cost of investigating 

 them and publishing the results, with the necessary illustrations, nothing 

 was done beyond i)lacing them in charge of Prof. Hamilton L. Smith, of 

 Geneva, N. Y., one of our best-known microscopists, and particularly 

 interested in the class of objects referred to. 



During the explorations of the Challenger particular attention was 

 paid to the collecting of samples of the sea bottom, and on her return 

 to England this branch of research was placed in charge of Mr. J. Mur- 

 ray, and at the request of this gentleman, indorsed by Professor Smith, 

 the material in hand was sent to him to be elaborated in the prepara- 

 tion of the systematic work covering the entire field. This was with the 

 stipulation that a special report should be prepared upon the material 

 collected by the vessels of the Navy, to be published, if so desired, by 

 the Navy Department. 



A very desirable arrangement has been made during the year by the 

 Institution in regard to the large collection of fossil plants brought in to 

 the National Museum by the explorations of Dr. Hay den. Major Powell, 

 Lieutenant Wheeler, &c., Prof. L. Lesquereux, of Columbus, Ohio, 

 having agreed to receive the collection in mass, to pick out a reserve 

 series for the Museum, and to bring all the duplicates of each species in 

 separate packages, so that sets can be readily made up for distribution 

 to the educational establishments and museums of the United States. 



The material sent to Professor Lesquereux filled many boxes, and a 

 portion of the reserve has already been returned to the Institution, 

 although not yet unijacked for want of a place for its exhibition. The 

 work will be completed with the publication of a report as soon as cer- 

 tain memoirs, now in press, are published, and it becomes possible 

 to state the page and i^late where each type specimen is illustrated. 



A part of the agreement with Professor Lesquereux is for the prepa- 

 ration of a complete check-list of the fossil plants of America, to include 

 Greenland and Alaska, to be used in connection with the proposed dis- 

 tribution of definite specimens and for the final arrangement of the 

 reserve series. 



Dr. C. A. White has been engaged upon the examination, classifica- 

 tion, and registering of the paleontological collections, embracing those 

 which have for many years been in the possession of the Museum, as 

 well as those which have been more recently received, preparatory to 

 their final arrangement in the new building. This work of investigation 

 has embraced a more or less complete study of those forms which have 

 been found to be new to science or otherwise of especial interest, and 

 their publication and illustration in the Proceedings of the National 

 Museum j and also, incidentally, the separation and labeling of the dupli- 



