REPORT OF THE SECRETARY. 57 



NcwCouiMlliiiMl, i\Iii,^(]al('ii Islands, and adjacent islands. An aocomitot' 

 this expedition will hr j^iveu in a i)ai»er l».v Mr. F. A. Lucas in Part 11 

 of the Itepoit of the Smithsonian Institntion lor 1888. 



The collection of the department of Ethnology has been enriched 

 by the receipt of a most valuable and interesting contribution of 

 specimens bi-ought from Easter Island, and also of a series of photo- 

 graphs taken on the island by Paj/master William J. Thomson, U. S. 

 Navy. 



Mr. W. T. Horuaday, curator of living animals, made a collecting 

 trij) to the Northwest in November and secured a large number of living 

 animals. 



Under the joint auspices of the Fish Commission and Smithsonian 

 Institution Mr. Charles 11. Townseiid made a collecting tour on Swan 

 Island and in Central America. As a result large collections of mam- 

 mals and birds were obtained for the Museum. 



During the summer Mr. E. II. Knowlton made a collection of the 

 ])lants, rocks, and ores of Vermont. 



During the year important changes have taken place in connection 

 with some of the scientific departments of the Museum. Dr. Charles 

 Rau^ Curator of the Department of Prehistoric Anthropology, died on 

 June 2G, 18S7.* His successor is Mr. Thomas Wilson, who received his 

 appointment as Uouorary Curator on December 1. In November Dr. II. 

 G. Beyer, U. S. Navy, Honorary Curator of the Section of Materia Medica, 

 was ordered to other duties, and Dr. J. M. Flint, U. S. Navy, the first Cura- 

 tor of this collection, has again taken charge. The Museum has com- 

 menced the formation of a collection of casts of Assyrian and Babylonian 

 antiquities, in association with the Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Paul 

 Haujjt, Professor of Semitic Languages in the Johns Hopkins Univer- 

 sity, was in February ai)pointed Honorary Curator, Dr. Cyrus Adier, of 

 the same university, consenting to act as Honorary Assistant Curator. 

 The Section of Transportation, under the care of Jlr. J. E. Watkins, has 

 now reached that point in its history where it may take rank with the 

 other sections of the Department of Arts and Industries. The Section 

 of Graphic Arts, under the curatorship of Mr. S. R. Koehler, has made 

 excelhmt progress toward the illustration of the resources of the art of 

 engraving in all its branches. On May 9 the Department of Living 

 Animals was organized, with Mr. W. T. Hornaday, Chief Taxidermist, as 

 curator. 



As in years i)ast, we have been called uj^on to contribute to local ex 

 hibitions, and numerous ai)plications have been made for material, 

 which has always been refused on the ground that nothing (;ouhl be done 

 without an order from Congress. Numerous bills of this kind have been 

 before Congress for consideration. One of these, passed during the fiscal 

 year of 1887, applied to the present year. This was the bill authorizing 

 *Soe Necrology, in a subsequent section. 



