REPOET OF THE SECRETARY. O 



ouly of the specimens themselves, but of the other collectious, should 

 fire break out among them. The new Museum building can, however, 

 be so arranged as to furnish such accommodations and not involve any 

 general danger. 



In this same connection it may be proper to state that strenuous 

 efforts are now being made, and with apparent prospect of success, 

 looking towards an exposition in 1892 — the four hundredth anniver- 

 sary of the discovery of America by Columbus— of a complete illus- 

 tration of the New World at that date, and of its progress in the arts 

 and industries in the four hundred years intervening. The collections 

 of the National Museum for the most part tend towards such a dis- 

 play, and if the new building in question were at our command it 

 would be a very easy matter to organize and arrange it with this ob- 

 ject in view, without unnecessary labor or great expense, and by the 

 date mentioned, as the result of the current work of the Museum, 

 without any spasmodic or unusual effort. 



EXPLORATIONS. 



There is not so much to record in the way of explorations for the 

 year 188G as has been the case in some previous years, duo mainly to 

 the fact of the completion of work in many of the districts, and of 

 the lack of sufficient means to inaugurate new enterprises of any 

 magnitude. The closing and withdrawal from the outposts in Alaska 

 and elsewhere of the U. S. Signal Service stations, have also cut off 

 a large field of labor, many of the most important explorations hav- 

 ing been conducted by the Smithsonian Institution in co-operation 

 with that establishment. Confining itself, as it has done in the main, 

 to North America as a field of research, the unknown portion, of 

 course, has in the nearly forty years of effort on the part of the Insti- 

 tution become greatly reduced. It is quite safe to say that to no es- 

 tablishment or agency is the knowledge of the geograx)hy, ethnology, 

 natural history, &c., of the continent more due than to the labors of 

 the Smithsonian Institution. 



Congress having directed the preparation and submission to it an- 

 nually of a separate and special report on the National Museum, a full 

 statement of the agencies of explorations and exchange by which ac- 

 cessions have been made will be found in the report of Mr. G. Brown 

 Goode, the assistant director, and therefore a briefer mention than 

 usual will be sufficient for the present occasion. 



Arctic America. — The last collections made by Mr. L. M. Turner, of 

 the TJ. S. Signal Office, at Ungava Bay, in Northern Labrador, have 

 been received, and he is now busily occupied in preparing his report on 

 the region visited. It is safe to say that we owe more to Mr. Turner for 

 our knowledge of Northern Labrador than to any other explorer or 

 naturalist, and the results of Ins labor will be found to be of the high- 



