REPORT OF ACTING ASSISTANT SECRETARY. 41 



tion, it haviug" beeu shown that they could scarcely be made interesting 

 or instructive to the public. A place was found for them in the labora- 

 tory, which for some time had been occupied by mammals, a change 

 which has the advantage of allowing them to be protected from the 

 light and make them accessible to students without intruding upon 

 the public. Type specimens were placed in special cases and guarded 

 from the light, which causes deterioration. 



The cases formerly used for the exhibition of fishes being old and of 

 a pattern not now considered suitable for such purposes, they were 

 removed to the laboratory and there made use of for the better arrange- 

 ment of the general study series. 



Mr. William H. Dall, curator of the Division of Mollusks, reports 

 the great collections of that division in good condition, but calls atten- 

 tion to the inconvenien(-e arising from overcrowding, which increases 

 year by year. A very large amount of material, comprising no less than 

 3,500 species of shells, was identified for correspondents of the Museum 

 during the year. In connection with this work, however, the Museum 

 receives many valuable specimens. 



There has been very great activity in the Division of Insects during 

 the year, which the honorary curator. Dr. L. O. Howard, regards as a 

 phenomenal one in the history of the division. He writes: 



The snrpiisiug part, however, is in the fact that the actual number of speciea and 

 specimeus and their scientific value surpasses anything in the history of the division, 

 since, notwithstanding the wonderful increase and value of the specimeus received 

 last year, due to the extensive exotic material presented by Dr. W. L. Abbott, those 

 received during the present year will moi'e than equal those received during the past 

 decade. This increase is due principally to the very large and valuable collection 

 of North American Coleoptera presented by Messrs. Hubbard and Schwarz, while it 

 is worthy of note that the additions, without this collection would be nearly three 

 times as large as those in the previous fiscal year. 



The collections are in a better state of preservation than ever before, 

 and a large amount of work has been done in rearranging and classify- 

 ing specimens. The material in each order has been divided according 

 to continents and arranged systematically, by which plan the labor of 

 identifying new material is considerably lessened. Dr. Dyar, custodian 

 of Lepidoptera, has rearranged the collections of that order, adding 

 many species from his private collection, and in both ways very greatly 

 increasing Ihe value of the collections. This voluntary work is of much 

 importance to the Museum and is highly ap])reciated. All the tyi)es and 

 cotypes at present in the collection have been properly labeled during 

 the year and recorded in a special catalogue. The whole number of 

 these specimens is nearly 6,000. 



The chief operation of the Division of Marine Invertebrates was the 

 preparation of 100 sets of duplicate specimens, designed for distribu- 

 tion to high schools throughout the country. Each set contains speci- 

 mens representative of about 100 species, and more than .SO, 000 

 specimens are included in the entire series. About one-half of these 



