ip REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1908, 
ing of the exhibition and many of the storage cases. Work on the 
reserve collection has been continued and been brought well up to 
date, some 3,390 cards and labels having been prepared. 
Dr. George P. Merrill, head curator of the department, made an 
extensive study of Meteor Crater, Canyon Diablo, which he began by 
a visit to the locality in May, 1907, under a grant from the Smith- 
sonian Institution. THis investigations tend to show that the crater 
was formed, not by voleanic explosion, but by impact, and presuma- 
bly from that of a giant meteorite. The results so far obtained have 
been published. 
Mineralogy.—Among the more valuable additions to the collection 
of minerals were specimens of the rare zeolite, edingtonite, from 
Bolet, Sweden, and of the rare calcium copper vanadate, calciovol- 
vorthite, from Paradox Valley, Colorado; a fine crystal of tapiolite, 
a columbo-tantalate, from Chanteloube, France; an excellent exam- 
ple of hydromagnesite from Alameda County, California; and speci- 
mens of meteoric iron from Williamstown, Kentucky; Ainsworth, 
Nebraska: and Crab Orchard, Rockwood County, Tennessee. The 
meteors were in part presented by Mr. E. EK. Howell, of Washington. 
The condition of the reserve collection has been much improved 
through the identification of many specimens and the writing of 
several thousand labels and catalogue cards. The exhibition collec- 
tion has been maintained in good condition, and a new series of de- 
scriptive labels is in course of preparation. 
Mr. Wirt Tassin, assistant curator of mineralogy, aided in the 
study of the materials from Meteor Crater, and made ten analyses 
of meteoric chromites, which represent over 65 per cent of the knewn 
analyses. Ife also investigated the minerals contained in certain 
sands from the vicinity of Norris, Montana, which resulted 1m the 
discovery of the rare thorium-uranium mineral, thorianite, and also 
of xenotime, zircon, monazite, and spinel. Numerous demands were 
made upon this division for chemical examinations for other branches 
of the Museum. 
Tnvertebrate paleontology.—Among the accessions received by this 
division were several of exceptional importance. The Smithsonian 
Institution made two very noteworthy deposits. The first consisted 
of the celebrated Gustav Hambach collection of fossil invertebrates, 
together with some specimens of fossil plants and vertebrate remains, 
containing many types and a number of specimens from the Prout 
and Shumard collections which for years were supposed to be lost. 
The second was the Gilbert collection of Niagaran fossils from north- 
ern Indiana, which formed the basis of Doctor Kindle’s studies on 
the subject, and, owing to the scarcity of fossil-vielding localities in 
this region and the number of types represented, is unique and prac- 
tically impossible of duplication. Much material was transmitted by 
