40 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1889. 



The number of specimens received during the year was about 6,000, 

 and 1,476 catalogue entries have been made. There are now, according 

 to Dr. Bean's report, about 30,000 specimens in the exhibition series, 

 60,000 specimens in the reserve series, and 25,000 duplicates. The Cu- 

 rator calls attention in his report to the inadequacy of the case and 

 storage room provided for the collection, and states that it has on this 

 account become necessary to arrange the jars containing recent addi- 

 tions upon the floor. 



Department of Molluslts. — The labeling, determiuiug, and registration 

 of old and new material has occupied a large share of the time of Mr. 

 William H. Dall, Honorary Curator, and his assistants. Seven cases, 

 containing a part of the Lea collection of Unionidee, have been arranged 

 for exhibition. Much progress has been made in cleaning and assort- 

 ing the fossils. Considerable time has been devoted to the arrange- 

 ment of the collection representing the fauna of the southeastern shores 

 of the United States and adjacent waters. A check-list of this fauna 

 is now being printed. The collection contains about fifteen thousand 

 specimens. Dr. R. E. C. Stearns, Adjunct Curator, has devoted a por- 

 tion of his time to the land and fresh water shells, especially of North 

 America. He has also pushed forward the revision and labeling of old 

 material. The Curator has supplied information of various kinds to 

 forty-three correspondents, necessitating a large amount of labor and 

 correspondence. 



Mr. Dall has found time to finish his investigation of the Mollusca 

 obtained by the United States steamer Blake under the supervision of 

 Professor Agassiz in the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea, and 

 has continued work on the dredgings obtained by the U. S. Fish Com- 

 mission in the same region, and also upon the collections obtained 

 last year by the U. S. Fish Commission steamer Albatross during its 

 voyage to California. He has also been occupied in a new systematic 

 arrangement of the bivalve shells, and has studied the correlation of 

 the tertiary fossils of the southeastern Atlantic coast with the recent 

 fauna. Dr. Stearns has prepared for publication a paper on prehistoric 

 shell money. 



Next in importance to the accessions received from the Fish Commis- 

 sion during the year is a collection consisting of about five thousand 

 specimens of shells from all parts of the world. This was presented by 

 Messrs. F. B. and J. D. McGuire on behalf of the heirs of the late J. C. 

 McGuire, of Washington. A collection containing about three hundred 

 species was received from the Auckland Museum, New Zealand. Inter- 

 esting series of specimens have been received from Messrs. E. W. 

 Webster and J. J. White. Small though valuable collections have 

 been presented by Mr. Henry Hemphill and Lieut. J. F. Moser, U. S. 

 Navy. Large collections of fossil shells have been received from the 

 U. S. Geological Survey, and of almost equal importance is the collec- 

 tion from the fossiliferous deposits of Florida, presented by Mr. Joseph 



