8 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1904. 



The principal sources of the collections may be briefly summarized 

 as follows: 



1. The explorations carried on more or less directly under the 

 auspices of the Smithsonian Institution, or by the Institution in con- 

 nection with educational institutions or commercial establishments, 

 and the efforts, since 1850, of its officers and correspondents toward 

 the accumulation of natural history and anthropological material. 



2. The United States Exploring Expedition around the world from 

 1838 to 1842, the North Pacific, or Perry, Exploring- Expedition from 

 1853 to 1856, and many subsequent naval expeditions down to and 

 including the recent operations in the West Indian and Philippine 

 waters. 



3. The activities of members of the United States diplomatic and 

 consular service abroad. 



4. The Government surveys at home, such as the Pacific Railroad 

 surveys, the Mexican and Canadian boundary surve3 T s, and the surveys 

 carried on by the Engineer Corps of the U. S. Army; and the activi- 

 ties of officers of the Signal Corps, and other branches of the Army 

 stationed in remote regions. 



5. The explorations of the U. S. Geological Survey, the U. S. Fish 

 Commission, the Department of Agriculture, the Bureau of American 

 Ethnology of the Smithsonian Institution, and other scientific branches 

 of the Government. 



0. Donations and purchases in connection with the several exposi- 

 tions at home and abroad in which the Museum and Fish Commission 

 have participated, among these having been the Centennial Exhibition 

 at Philadelphia in 1870, the International Fisheries Exhibitions at Berlin 

 in 1880 and at London in 1883, the New Orleans Cotton Centennial 

 Exposition in 1881 and 1885, the Cincinnati Exposition of 1888, the 

 World's Columbian Exposition at Chicago in 1893, the expositions at 

 Atlanta in 1895, at Nashville in L897, at Omaha in L898, the Pan- 

 American Exposition of 1901, and the Charleston Exposition of 

 1901-02. The returns from the World's Fair in Philadelphia were of 

 greatest extent, comprising, besides the collections displayed by the 

 United States in illustration of the animal and mineral resources, the 

 fisheries, and the ethnology of the native races of the country, valuable 

 gifts from thirty of the foreign governments which participated, as 

 well as the industrial collections of numerous manufacturing and com- 

 mercial houses of Europe and America. 



7. Exchanges with foreign and domestic museums and with indi- 

 viduals. 



Immediately preceding the Centennial Exhibition of 1870, when the 

 collections were entirely provided for in the Smithsonian building, 

 the number of entries of specimens in the Museum record books was 



