KEPOET OF THE SECRETARY. 47 



(B) Mesozoic Section. — Dr. 0. A. White, of the U. S. Geological Survey, 

 honorary curator, reports a total of 1,5G3 entries in the catalogue dur- 

 ing the year. The princii)al additions are those which have been sent 

 by the U. S. Geological Survey. The work of arranging and classify- 

 ing the collections has progressed steadily, and they are now accessible 

 for purposes of study. The provisional arrangement is purely strati- 

 grai^hical, only a broad biological classification having been attempted 

 under each geological period. The tyj)e specimens have been re-identi. 

 fied by Mr. J. B. Marcou, who has i)ublished a catalogue of the same 

 in the Proceedings of the Museum.* 



(C) Genozoio Section. — This department, organized since the change of 

 Mr. Dall from the Coast Survey to tLie Geological Survey, in which he 

 is oflicially serving as paleontologist in charge of the later formations, 

 is practically incorporated with the department of mollusks. 



XIV and XV. De])art7nents of Fossil and Recent Plants. — The botanical 

 collections are under the honorary curatorship of Prof. Lester F.Ward, 

 of the U. S. Geological Survey, and Mr. F. H. Knowltou, one of the assist- 

 ants of the Museum. The attention of th€ curator is chiefly directed 

 toward the study of the fossil plants, a subject upon which he is now 

 the principal American authority. His sketch of the history and pres- 

 ent condition of fossil botany, published during the year as one of the 

 bulletins of the Geological Survey, gives an excellent idea of the char- 

 acter of the work he has undertaken to accomi)lish in connection with 

 the national collections. The number of si)ecimens added during the 

 year has not been great, attention having been chiefly concentrated 

 upon the preliminary work of classification and arrangement. The 

 herbarium of recent plants contains now not less than 30,000 specimens. 

 The largest and most valuable accessions during the year were the col- 

 lections from Texas and the adjacent States and Te1?ritories, gift of 

 Dr. V. Havard, U. S. Army, the types of his paper upon "the Flora of 

 Texas," published iu the Proceedings of the Museum. An important 

 piece of routine work accomplished has been the completion of the card- 

 catalogue of the Joad collection of Old World plants, recently acquired 

 from the Botanical Gardens at Kew, through the Harvard Herbarium. 

 This collection contains about 10,000 species, 9,000 of which were new 

 to the herbarium. The card- catalogue system, as applied to the arrange- 

 ment of the American herbarium, has proved to be of great practical 

 value, since it renders it possible to ascertain the presence or absence 

 of any species without going through cases. 



"This," remarks the curator, "is believed to be the only large her- 

 barium in this country iu which this system has been adopted, and the 

 labor of keeping it up will be very slight compared with what it would 

 be to prepare such a catalogue after the accumulation of a great mass 

 of material. No species is considered as belonging to the collection 



* Vol. VIII, pp. 290-344. 



