REPORT OF ACTING ASSISTANT SECRETARY. 39 



iiicreasino- tlio collections. As stated in previous reports, it is espe- 

 cially necessary tliat more money be provided for the purchase of speci- 

 mens for the department of mammals. 



The accessions of greatest importance are as follows: 



An excellent general collection from lower Slam, consisting of 105 

 specimens, was presented by Dr. W. L. Abbott, to whom the Museum 

 is already so much indebted for valuable material. Two skins of the 

 Mount St. Elias bear were obtained by purchase. Dr. E. A. Mearns, 

 U. S. A., presented valuable collections from the Catskill Mountains 

 and from the vicinity of the District of Columbia, amounting in all to 

 385 specimens. There was also obtained by purchase an excellent 

 series of skins and skeletons of lemurs and other jNfadagascan mammals. 

 Two specimens of the recently described pigmy African tlying squir- 

 rels, genus IfUnrus, were obtained from Mr. A\'illiam B. Filer. They 

 are from Efulen, Cameroons district, and appear to represent a new 

 species. A number of skins of the larger lemurs, not previously repre- 

 sented in the collection, were purchased, and in the same manner three 

 skeletons and a skull of Glohiocephala hrachyptera were obtained. 



Mr. William ralmer and Mr. D. W. Prentiss, jr., both of the National 

 Museum, colle(;ted ai number of mammals in tlie District of Columbia 

 and vicinity, and in the Dismal Swamp, Virginia. Nine fur seals were 

 collected by Dr. Leonhard Stejneger, and Mr. F. A. Lucas obtained 

 twelve skulls of the same animal on the Pribilof Islands. Six other 

 members of the Museum staff have also sent in from one to four speci- 

 mens each. 



The Kent Scientific Institute, Grand Rapids, Michigan, through Mr. 

 C. A. Whittemore, curator, lent for study a young specimen of a very 

 rare Bassaruyon from Honduras. 



During the early part of 1897 the preparation of an exhibit of mam- 

 mals for the Tennessee Centennial Exposition was begun. This exhibit, 

 as linally installed, consisted of a group of Proboscis monkeys, a group 

 of gibbons, and a number of mounted specimens of lemurs, exhibited 

 in two unit cases. 



A monograph or revision of the American moles was published by the 

 curator during the year. The manuscript of a paper on the antlers of 

 the American deer has been nearly completed, but the work has neces- 

 sarily been suspended for the present. The i)roper nomenclature of 

 the whalebone whales has occupied the curator's attention during such 

 time as he could devote to the subject. 



Dr. E. A. Mearns, U. S. A., has continued his studies of the mammals 

 collected during the survey of the INIexican boundary, and has pub- 

 lished the results in several preliminary papers in the Proceedings. 

 The titles of these papers are given in the Bibliography (Appendix IV). 

 A general treatise on tlie vertebrate animals of the Mexican boundary, 

 by Dr. ^learns, will ])robably be published in the Ibrm of a bulletin. 

 Valuable assistance on technical matters has been rendered by Dr. 



