REPORT OF ACTING ASSISTANT SECRETARY. 61 



STUDENTS AND INVESTIGATORS. 



During the year covered by this report the following persons luive 

 been accorded access to the collections in the Mnseam: 



Mr. E. W. Kelson, of the Department of Agriculture, has spent much 

 time in the study of Eskimo collections and has completed a mono- 

 graph on the subject. Mr. P. C. Boyle, of Oil City, Pennsylvania, 

 studied the collection of lamj)s and illuminating devices. Mr. Stewart 

 Oulin, Director of the Museum of Archaeology and Palaeontology, Uni- 

 versity of Pennsylvania, has had access to the collections of games 

 in connection with the preparation of a paper. Mr. J. D. McGuire, 

 of Ellicott City, Maryland, has continued his work upon the pipes of 

 the American aborigines. The results of his investigations have been 

 embodied in a paper which will appear in the Report of the Museum 

 for 1897 (now in press). Major J. W. Powell, Director of the Bureau 

 of American Ethnology, examined the pipes collected by himself iu 

 Utah many years ago. Dr. J. Walter Fewkes has prosecuted investi- 

 gations upon the material which he recently collected in the Southwest, 

 and has prepared a report upon his explorations during 1897-98. In 

 the Division of Historic Archwlogy information has been given to the 

 following: Mr. Richard Fisher, San Antonio, Texas; Mr. F. W. Hodge, 

 Bureau of Ethnology; Hon. Oscar Straus, Mr. George W. Moon, Lon- 

 don, England; and Prof. H. Hyvernat, of the Catholic University, 

 Washington. 



Prof. James Hine, of the Ohio State University, consulted the Museum 

 collection of Neuroptera. Mr. Arthur C. Bradley, of Newport, New 

 Hampshire, examined the Noctuid.e for the purpose of identitying 

 specimens collected in New Hampshire. Mr. Nathan Banks, of the 

 Department of Agriculture, has frequently examined the Arachnida 

 and allied classes for purposes of study and identification. Prof. 

 Roland Thaxter, of Harvard University, spent several days during 

 March examining the collection of Coleoptera for minute fungi found 

 growing on their elytra. He secured some very rare si)ecies from tlie 

 exotic beetles. Professor Thaxter is engaged in monographing this 

 group of fungi (the Tjaboulbeniaceiie). Mrs. Annie T. Slosson and Doctor 

 Prime, of Franconia, New Hampshire; Mr. O. W. Barrett, of Claren- 

 don, Vermont; Dr. J. W. Holland, of Pittsburg, Pennsylvania; Dr. H. 

 G. Griffith and Mr. WiHiam J. Fox, of Philadelphia; Prof. F. M. Web- 

 ster, of Wooster, Ohio; and many others have consulted the collections 

 in the Division of Insects during the year. 



Mr. E. W. Nelson, Dei)artment of Agriculture, spent three months 

 or more studying the Mnseum collection of Mexican birds in connec- 

 tion with the determination ol the material collected by him in Mex- 

 ico for the Biological Survey. Mr. H. C. Oberholser, Department 

 of Agricultnre, studied the Horned Larks, with a view to revising 

 the group; the forms of Thryot horns bewicki, with a view to the prep- 



