REPORT OF THE DIRECTOR. 



Albany, January^ 1886. 



To the Honorable^ the Board of Regents of the University of the 

 State of New York : 



Gentlemen — Under the requirements of the law organizing 

 the State Museum, I beg leave herewith to communicate the annual 

 report (being the thirty-ninth in consecutive order) upon the con- 

 ditions of the collections in the several departments as far as the same 

 have come under my knowledge or direction, with a statement of 

 the additions made thereto, and the work done in the Museum dur- 

 ing the past year. 



The report of last year has been printed and delivered, some 

 months since, and the series is now complete with the exception of 

 the thirty-second report, which exists only as a legislative document. 

 That re])ort is an important one, and I would most earnestly recom- 

 mend the early reprinting of the same, together with the plates 

 which accompanied the original report on its presentation to the 

 Legislature, but which were not published with the document 

 edition. 



Under the conditions of the public printing existing at the time 

 this report was made, and also from the fact that no resolution was 

 passed ordering the usual number of copies for the Board of Regents, 

 1 see no impropriety in re-communicating this report to the Legisla- 

 ture, accompanied by a statement of the facts, and leave the matter 

 to the discretion of the committee on public printing. 



In order to avoid longer delay I have herewith communicated, 

 from the Thirty-second Report, an important paper on the 

 Annelidas Chaetopoda, which was printed in that Report without 

 the accompanying illustrations. These had been mislaid by the 

 printer, and were supposed to be lost until last year, 



I have likewise communicated a copy of a "Report on Building 

 Stones," made to the Capitol Commissioners in 1868, 



It was originally the intention of the Director to make this report 

 more complete by farther examinations of quarries within the State 

 and elsewhere, and to insert the results of tests of strength which 

 had been made during the investigations undertaken for the Capitol 

 Commissioners, but other duties have prevented this work, and the 

 report is offered as a small contribution to our knowledge on the 

 subject.* 



* Two hundred and fifty copies of the Report were printed by the Capitol Commissioners, 

 and the pamphlet is now out of print. 



[Asseni. Doc, Xo, 104:.] 2 



