REPORT OF ASSISTANT SECRETARY. 78 



chalcid-flies of the ^uiierfaiiiily Chalcidoidea, a complex fully as largo as the Icli- 

 iieuiiKiiKiidea. The material in this suiieffamily in the national collection is most 

 valuable and has heen arranged by Mr. Ashmead ac(X)rding to his classification. ! U- 

 also continues his work on a monograph of the North American Bracoiiid.c iK'gun 

 ten years ago, and has every reason to believe that his manuscript will ))e ready for 

 publication in the Proceedings of the Museum this fall, lli" has also linished and 

 lianded in for pul)licatiou in the Proceedings of the Washington Academy of Sciences 

 his reports on (1) the Rynchota of the Harriman exi)edition, and (2) the Hymenoj)- 

 tera r)f the Galapagos Islands, collected by the Leland Stanford Junior University 

 expedition. Mr. Ashmead has also done much work upon a catalogue of the 

 Hymenoptera of North America and the West Indies. A' complete bibliograi)hical 

 catalogue of our species has never been published, and it is believed that such a 

 work will be found useful and valuable. Difhculty has been found in ])lacing some 

 of the species described from Mexico and Central America, and before these can be 

 assigned to their proper genera it will be necessary to examine the -types in the 

 British Museum. 



jNIr. Coquillett has com))leted a synoi)sis of the dipterous family ('luronomid;c. 



Dr. Dyar has completed and handed in for publication in tii-e Proceedings a cata- 

 logue of the North American Lepidoptera north of INlexico. 



Mr. Currie has been engaged when other work would i>erniit in monographing 

 the North American species of the antlion flies, family Myrmeleonida'. He has 

 begun the compilation of a catalogue of the neuropteroid insects of North America. 



Mr. F. A. Lucas completed a paper on latiloid lishes. 



The scientific work of the ])otanists has covered a wide field. Mr. 

 F. V. Coville, Honorary Curator of the Division of Plants, continued 

 his studies upon the genera Sali.r and Rthes^ and is also preparing a 

 flora of Alaska. He published during the 3'ear a paper on a new genus 

 of heather, IlarrlmaiuJla^ of which specimens were obtained by the 

 Haniman Alaska expedition, and a paper on two species of Rihei<. 

 Dr. J. N. Rose continued work on the Mexican flora, and engaged 

 with Dr. N. L. Britton in preparing a revision of the Crassulacew of 

 North America. Mr. C. L. Pollard published papers describing new 

 species of violets and of (Jlianisecrhta^ also a popular account of plant 

 families and on the formation of the Florida Keys. Mr. W. R. Maxon 

 pu))lished A'arious notes on ferns. 



COOPERATION OF STECIALISTS AND LOAN OF SPECIMENS. 



The Museum has always enjoyed the cooperation of s})e('ialists in 

 difl^erent branches of sj'stematic zoology and ])otany in classifying 

 the collections and identifying species in groups with which the mem- 

 bers of the scientiflc stafl' are not familiar. These transactions are of 

 a varied nature. Sometimes the use of all the Museum specimens of 

 a group are solicited l)y a specialist engaged in pre])aring a monograph, 

 to enalde him to ])ase his conclusions on greater masses of material 

 than he personally has at his disposition. In cases of this kind the 

 Museum benefits chiefly by having the specimens in its collection identi- 

 fied. In other instances the Museum asks the assistance of an expert 

 in working up a collection, both to get the specimens identified and to 



