4 Director's Annual Report. 



acted as Assistant, to our great satisfaction, died of typhoid fever 

 not long after his return to his regular school work on Honokaa, 

 Hawaii, and every member of the staff mourns the loss of a col- 

 league and dear friend. 



The Curatorship of Ornithology has not been filled, although 

 there have been applications for the position, because with the 

 limited income of the Museum it is impossible to fill all the posi- 

 tions that should be made in a museum of the size and rank of this 

 institution, and, as much work had been done on the collection and 

 preservation of birds until the specimens were very numerous and 

 the portion of our library devoted to this branch was rich in the 

 working literature of ornithology, it seemed better to turn our 

 limited powers to some other department where a skilled worker 

 was greatly needed, and such an one was unquestionably Botany. 

 Not only do our valuable collections need the care of an expert , 

 but they should be so increased that by exchange we could acquire 

 ample specimens of the Polynesian flora on other groups, such as 

 New Zealand, Tahiti, Samoa and Tonga. With the exception of 

 a good collection of New Zealand ferns we have nothing from the 

 rest of the Pacific, and as we have few, if any, botanists on this 

 group, the Director finds great difficulty in answering the frequent 

 requests for specimens or definite botanical information. With a 

 competent botanist we could be of no little use to man}- institu- 

 tions and botanical workers abroad as well as able to acquire new 

 material in this line for our herbarium and cases. Our library 

 should be largely increased in botanical literature, although it is 

 already not to be despised. Still there are whole families of 

 Hawaiian plants needing thorough study and illustration, such as 

 the very remarkable and interesting tree lobelias so important a part 

 of the Hawaiian flora. I had hoped to take this in hand myself 

 and had collected much material for illustration and had prepared 

 a few colored plates, but the pressing work of administration has 

 hitherto made the prosecution of such a great work impossible for 

 me, and I had thought perhaps if a suitable botanist and collector 



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