•16 ANNUAL EEPOET SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1913. 



tion in all branches of human knowledge believed to be of value to 

 those interested in the promotion of science and the welfare of man. 



The Smithsonian Contributions to Knowledge, in quarto form, 

 and the Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collections, in octavo, are printed 

 at the expense of the Smithsonian fund, and necessarily in limited 

 editions, being distributed chiefly to certain large libraries through- 

 out the world, where they are available for public reference. The 

 Smithsonian Annual Report, however, is printed at the expense of 

 congressional appropriations, and in an edition of several thousand 

 copies, thus permitting its wide distribution. The principal feature 

 of the annual rejDort is a general appendix containing about 30 se- 

 lected or original memoirs illustrating the more remarkable and im- 

 portant developments in the physical and natural sciences, as well 

 as showing the general character of the operations of the Institution. 



In addition to the publications mentioned above, there are several 

 other series of works issued under the direction of the Institution 

 through its various branches or bureaus. These include the Annual 

 Eeport, and the Proceedings and Bulletin of the National Museum; 

 the Contributions from the National Herbarium; the Annual Report 

 and Bulletins of the Bureau of American Ethnology; and the An- 

 nals of the Astrophysical Observatory, all of which are Government 

 publications, being printed through annual allotments by act of 

 Congress. 



Smithsonia7i Contributions to Knoivledge. — ^The chief character- 

 istic of memoirs printed in the Contributions to Knowledge is that 

 they are records and discussions of original investigations and con- 

 stitute important additions to knowledge. Since the establishment 

 of this series in 1848, about 150 of these memoirs have been published 

 in 35 quarto volumes. The most recent memoir of this series, re- 

 viewed in my last report, was the " Langley Memoir on Mechanical 

 Flight," recording the experiments of the late Secretary Langley, 

 wdiich resulted in his successful demonstration of the practicability 

 of aerial navigation with machines heavier than air. 



Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collections. — In this series 40 papers 

 were issued, forming parts of five volumes, the titles of which are 

 enumerated in the appendix herewith. Among these numerous 

 papers were two articles by the secretary describing further results 

 of his studies of Cambrian fossils, a bibliography of the geology 

 and mineralogy of tin, and a large number of papers descriptive of 

 results of the Smithsonian African expedition under Col. Roosevelt, 

 the Paul J. Rainey African expedition, and the Smithsonian biologi- 

 cal survey of the Panama Canal Zone. There were also in press at the 

 close of the year three additional papers on Cambrian fossils, one 

 of them, in particular, giving an account of the Mount Robson region ; 

 and a paper, as already mentioned, by Dr. Leonard Hill and other 



