362 REPORT— 1901. 



Index Animalium. — Report of the Committee, consisting of Dr. Henry 

 Woodward (Chairman), Mr. W. E. Hoyle, Mr. R. McLachlan, 

 Dr. P. L. ScLATER, Rev. T. R. R. Stebbing, and Dr. F. A. Bather 

 (Secretary). 



The Committee has the honour to report that during the last year the 

 whole of the entries covering the period from 1758-1800 have been 

 arranged, sorted, the duplicate entries eliminated, and the remainder — 

 about 62,000 — got ready for press. Of these perhaps some 6,000 are 

 duplicates, but owing to the loose methods of authors the compiler 

 cannot decide, and it has been thought better to include them, leaving it 

 to the specialist to reject such duplicates rather than to run the risk of 

 omitting a possibly important entry. Negotiations entered into with the 

 Cambridge University Press have ended in a satisfactory manner, and 

 the work of printing this first part of the Index was begun at the end of 

 May 1901. The work will take about twenty months to go through the 

 press, will comprise some 1,000 pages, and will be provided with an index 

 to the trivial names under genera, the same slips as are used for the main 

 work being re-sorted under genera as fast as they come off the press. This 

 method has been adopted for several reasons, e.g., the great expenditure 

 of time if a copy of all the slips were made, and the fact that those who 

 desire to know what trivial names are included under a genus can as 

 easily refer to the end as to the body of the book. 



A complete list of works consulted has been prepared, and will be 

 printed : this will be annotated througiiout with bibliographic notes as to 

 dates and contents, and should prove of considerable value to librarians 

 and others as regards the rarer literature. It is gratifying to be able to 

 report that very few publications have eluded the search of the compiler, 

 but these Mr. C. Davies Sherborn does not regard as likely to be of 

 importance. They may possibly contain a few specific names, but it is 

 hardly probable. 



The indexing of 1801-1900 continues, and will proceed more rapidly 

 now the eai-ly M8. is out of hand. It is hoped that the finished work, 

 when it appears, will fully justify both the time spent upon it and the 

 generous support received from the British Association, the Royal Society, 

 and the Zoological Society, and that the Committee will have placed at 

 its disposal an oven more liberal support in the future. It must be 

 remembered that up to the present every entry, and every portion of the 

 purely mechanical part of the work, has been done by Mr. Sherborn, and 

 that many months of his time could have been saved for the more 

 important labour of recording had the Committee been able to pay for 

 the assistance of even a boy to do the sorting, alphabetical arrangement, 

 and numbering of the slips. However, as it is, we have now the results 

 of the labours of one man, and the Committee regards this as showing in 

 a most satisfactory manner the definite plan of the proposer and compiler 

 of this colossal undertaking. 



The Committee earnestly requests its reappointment, with a grant 

 of 100^. 



