32 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1920. 



The division of textiles received for exhibition from the Depart- 

 ment of Ordnance, War Department, specimens of silk cartridge 

 cloth which was so essential in the preparation of separate loading 

 ammunition for all the large guns taking part in the Great War; 

 also examples of this same fabric showing the results of the experi- 

 ments made to demonstrate the value for civilian uses of the eleven 

 million yards sold as surplus material. There were added by gift 

 many specimens of knitted fabrics contributed by American manu- 

 facturers, and made from artificial silk, avooI, and mohair. 



The collections in the division of medicine were enlarged by a 

 series of pharmaceutical preparations illustrating the various forms in 

 which medicinal substances are prepared for administration, a series 

 of essential oils, and an addition to the materia medica collections 

 of a large number of inorganic chemicals. The exhibits planned to 

 illustrate the basic principles of different schools of medicine were 

 increased by many gifts, and the one devoted to Homeopathy com- 

 pleted. The section of pharmacy received many documents and pub- 

 lications bearing on the history of the United States Pharmacopoeia, 

 and the complete series of written and printed records of the last 

 revision of this important work amounting to many thousands of 

 pages. 



The exhibition collections of the section of wood technology were 

 much improved by a transfer from the Forest Service of twenty-five 

 colored transparencies and forty-eight colored bromide enlargements 

 especially prepared for the National Museum, representing typical 

 forest scenes, methods of lumbering and forest industries, and by the 

 gift of exhibit material illustrating the use of wood waste and wood 



pulp. 



Many specimens of edible and inedible oils, developed as a branch 

 of the meat-packing industry, and samples of the official tea stand- 

 ards, used from 1915 to 1920, to control the quality of the foreign 

 teas imported by the United States, were added to the collections of 

 animal and vegetable products. 



In the division of mineral technology the principal addition was 

 a working model of a salt works, donated by the Worcester Salt 

 Company, being a replica of that company's operations near War- 

 saw, New York. A system of circulating water is caused to mine 

 the native salt, bring it to the surface in solution and finally to sur- 

 render it, the whole taking place before the visitor's eyes. The 

 National Lead Company contributed 26 large transparencies and 

 about 600 exhibition samples needed in completing the comprehensive 

 exhibit illustrating the lead industry undertaken several years ago, 

 and which now lacks only competent technical direction in installa- 

 tion. The work of the division was largely at a standstill, by the 

 transfer elsewhere in the Museum at the beginning of the year of 



