REPORT OF THE SECRETARY. 51 



the city atteudiug the Tnauguratiou cermoiiies, no less than 86,107 per- 

 sons visited the Smithsonian and Museum buildings. 



Personnel. — During the year a department of forestry has been estab- 

 lished, and with the consent of the Secretary of Agriculture, Dr. B. E. 

 Fernow, chief of the forestry division of the Department of Agriculture, 

 has been appointed its curator. 



Dr. George Vasey, of the Department of Agriculture, has been aj)- 

 liointed curator of botany, and in that capacity controls the botanical 

 collections in the National Museum and in the Department of Agri- 

 culture. Prof. Paul Haupt, curator of Oriental antiquities in the Na- 

 tional Museum, was designated as the representative of the Smithsonian 

 Institution at the Eighth International Congress of Orientalists, to meet 

 in Stockholm and Christiania in September. Prof. Otis T. Mason was 

 instructed to proceed to Europe to visit the principal ethnological mu- 

 seums of France, Germany, Denmark, and England, for the purpose of 

 making arrangements for the increase of the collections at the U. S. 

 National Museum, and incidentally, through the study of methods of 

 installation, of providing for the more efiectual preservation and utiliza- 

 tion of these collections. Mr. Thomas Wilson was directed to proceed to 

 Europe to visit the priucijial museums of France, England, and Dublin 

 for the purpose of studying the methods of installation employed by 

 the European museums. 



On August 13, Mr. Silas Stearns, of Pensacola, Fla., who for many 

 years has been a correspondent of the Smithsonian Institution, and has 

 made important coUectious of fishes in the Gulf of Mexico, died at 

 Asheville, N. C. 



Explorations. — During the summer of 1888, Mr. George P. Merrill, 

 curator of geology, made a collecting trip to North Carolina, Pennsyl- 

 vania, New York, Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and Maine. 

 Large collections of rocks were obtained for the Museum. Mr. Thomas 

 Wilson, curator of prehistoric anthropology, visited mounds in Ohio, 

 and made interesting collections. Ensign W. L. Boward, U. S. Navy, 

 who, acting under orders from the Navy Department, sailed for Kotze- 

 bue Sound in May last, is making collections in Alaska for the National 

 Museum. Prof. O. P. Jenkins, of De Pauw University, Indiana, is vis- 

 iting the Hawaiian Islands for the purpose of collecting fishes. A series 

 of his specimens has been promised for the National Museum. In 

 Augcnst Dr. W. F. Hillebrand, of the U. S. Geoglogical Survey, visited 

 some of the Western States and Territories partly with a view to 

 making collections of minerals. These will eventually bo incorporated 

 with the Museum collections. 



Centennial Exposition of the Ohio Valley and Central States. — The act 

 of Congress directing the Executive Departments of the Government, 

 the Department of Agriculture, and the Smithsonian Institution (includ- 



