80 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1904. 



important herbarium, comprising about 60,000 sheets, and his botan- 

 ical library, numbering about 2,000 volumes. This valuable acquisi- 

 tion will open new opportunities to s} T stematic botanists in the United 

 States of which they will, without doubt, hasten to avail themselves. 

 The details regarding this important deposit will be found in the report 

 of the Assistant Secretary. 



Mrs. T. A. Williams, of Memphis, Nebraska, presented some 15,000 

 plants from various localities in the United States, consisting of the 

 duplicates from Mr. Williams's herbarium. She also signified her 

 intention to deposit the herbarium itself, now in the George Washing- 

 ton University, but the actual transfer had not been effected at the 

 close of the year on account of press of other Museum business. 



Of zoological material, the largest accession was a collection of 

 about 40,000 insects obtained by Messrs. Dyar, Currie, and Caudell in 

 British Columbia. Next in order are the collections received through 

 the Bureau of Fisheries, Department of Commerce and Labor. These 

 comprised about 12,000 land and fre^h-water shells and about 670 

 reptiles from Indiana and other parts of the eastern United States 

 and 3,000 marine mollusks, chiefly from Alaska, preserved in alcohol. 

 The Bureau also transmitted the types of a considerable number of 

 recently-described fishes from the Hawaiian Islands, Japan, and other 

 localities, with other specimens of fishes and also large collections of 

 crustaceans and stony corals, which were obtained during the investi- 

 gation of the salmon fisheries of Alaska in 1903. In addition, the 

 Bureau transmitted a large series of crayfishes and shrimps from Lake 

 Maxinkuckee, Indiana, collected by Dr. B. W. Evermann and assist- 

 ants in 1899 and 1900, and also 461 plants collected in Alaska and 

 Oregon. 



Special attention is again to be directed to the importance of the col- 

 lections made by Dr. W. L. Abbott in the East Indies and veiy gener- 

 ously presented by him to the National Museum. During the year 

 the collections received were those from the Mentawei Archipelago, 

 off the west coast of Sumatra, and from the coast and islands of eastern 

 Sumatra. The mammals from the Mentawi Archipelago comprised 

 about 500 specimens, including 31 new forms, among which were a 

 new genus and species of gibbon, named Simias concolor by Mr. G. S. 

 Miller, jr., and another new gibbon, which Mr. Miller has named 

 ' Symphalangia Mossi in honor of Dr. Abbott's associate, Mr. C. B. 

 Kloss. The birds from the archipelago number 572 specimens, includ- 

 ing several new species and many rare ones, such as the pigeon 

 Columba grisea, the cuckoo Urococcyx seneicauda, etc. The collection 

 from eastern Sumatra comprises 371 mammals, 202 birds, and 83 rep- 

 tiles and batrachians. The mammals have not yet been identified, but 

 among the birds and reptiles are known to be numerous forms not 



