REPORT OF ASSISTANT SECRETARY. 61 



Of the number of species of North American fishes, it is impossible 

 toform even an api)roximate estimate, the increase havingheenso great. 

 It will not, however, be too ninch to say that the Institution has be- 

 tween four or five hundred species either entirely new or else de- 

 scribed first from its shelves. 



Of skeletons and skulls of North American vertebrata, the Smith- 

 sonian series is very full, embracing, as shown by a preceding table, 

 over 3,000 specimens. 



The collection of minerals and fossils, (including those gathered 

 by nearly all the United States geological surveys, as by Dr. D. D. 

 Owen, C. T. Jackson, Foster and Whitney, Evans, &c.,) are all 

 carefully classed and catalogued, so as to correspond with and fully 

 illustrate the reports of these gentlemen. There is also a large col- 

 lection of geological specimens, made many years ago in New Mexico 

 and Texas, as well as in Sonora, Chihuahua, and other portions of 

 northern Mexico, which, with the accompanying notes, furnish indi- 

 cations of many mineral regions and mining localities now totally 

 unknown to the people of the United States. Hints are to be derived 

 from a careful study of this collection of the highest importance in 

 the development of the mineral region along the Mexican boundary 

 line. 



It may, perhaps, be well here briefly to mention the government 

 expeditions, by which these collections were made from time to time, 

 under the authority of the departments. The present and preceding 

 reports contain much fuller details concerning them. 



A. — Geological Surveys. 



1. The survey of Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, and a portion of 

 Nebraska, by Dr. David Dale Owen. 



2. The survey of the Lake Superior district, by Dr. Charles T. 

 Jackson. 



3. The survey of the same region, by Messrs. Foster and Whitney. 



4. The survey of Oregon, by Dr. John Evans. 



B. — Boundary Surveys. 



5. The survey of the line between the United States and Mexico, 

 first organized under honorable J. B. Weller, as commissioner, and 

 Major W. H. Emory, as chief of the scientific department, then under 

 John R. Bartlett, commissioner^ and Colonel J. D. Grraham, chief of 

 the scientific corps, succeeded subsequently by Major W. H. Emory, 

 then under General R. B. Campbell, commissioner, and Major W. 

 H. Emory, chief of the scientific corps. 



6. Tfie survey of the boundary line of the Gadsden purchase, 

 under Major W. H. Emory, commissioner. 



