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REPORT OF ASSISTANT SECRETARY. 61 



certain sum for printing, no reference was made in making the appro- 

 priation for the Museum, but the money was given in the gross sum 

 allotted to the Interior Department as a Printing Fund. 



In 1888, however, a separate appropriation was made for the lirst 

 time in these words: "For the National Museum, for printing labels 

 and blanks and for the Bulletins and Annual Volumes of the Proceed- 

 ings of the Museum, $10,000." 



In 1880 the appropriation for the fiscal year 1800 was made in the 

 same words, but was not included as heretofore in the appropriations 

 for the Department of the Interior. 



The edition of the earlier volumes of the Proceedings and Bulletins 

 was usually only 1,000, of which a portion was distributed by the De- 

 partment of the Interior aud a portion by the Museum, the number 

 received being sometimes as many as 500, and sometimes as few as U50.* 

 The edition placed at the disposal of the Museum being so small and 

 withal so uncertain as to number, the distribution was always of neces- 

 sity informal, and no effort was made, except in the case of the signa- 

 tures of Proceedings, already referred to, to provide for supplying 

 copies to a regular list of institutions and specialists. A considerable 

 number were used up in the work of the Museum, and the others were 

 sent to correspondents of the Museum in exchange for publications, for 

 specimens, and incidentally to such institutions as might apply for 

 copies, as well as to individuals, especially students who made it evi- 

 dent that they were in a position to make good use of the books. 



In some cases, as, for instance, that of the catalogues of the Animal 

 Products and Fisheries Collection at the Centennial Exhibition in 1876 

 (Bulletin 14); the catalogue of the Exhibit of the Fisheries and Fish 

 Culture of the United States of America at the International Fishery 

 Exhibition at Berlin in 1880 (Bulletin 18), and the catalogue of the col- 

 lection exhibited by the United States at the International Fisheries 

 Exhibition at Loudon in 1883 (Bulletin 27), the entire edition, and 

 indeed an extra large number of copies also, were entirely absorbed in 

 special uses in connection with the exhibition work. I n other instances, 

 such as Coues and Prentiss's "Catalogue of the Birds of the District of 

 Colombia" (Bulletin 26) and Ward's -Guide to the Flora of Washing- 

 ton and Vicinity" (Bulletin 22) the books were largely distributed to 

 supply a local demand. 



It was, in fact, not intended that formal publication of these docu- 

 ments should be made from the advance edition to which I have re- 

 ferred. 



Formal publication was undertaken by the Smithsonian Institution, it 

 being the intention that, the first cost of composition and electrotyping 

 having been provided for by the special Congressional appropriation, 

 the Smithsonian Institution should avail itself of the electrotype-plates 



* The- records show thai of Bulletin :..\ -jr>( » copies wore received; of Bulletin 2'J, 

 244 ; of Bulletin 25, 390 ; of Bulletins 27 and M, 4f><). 



