224 



THE AUSTRALIAN MUSEUM MAGAZINE. 



doomed to extinction, surely it is ad- 

 visable that scientific institutions should 

 be allowed to obtain the comparatively 

 few specimens necessary to exhibit to 

 posterity the characteristics of these 

 interesting animals. 



Let us not, then, put unreasonable 

 obstacles in the ])ath of our scientific 

 confreres. Their efforts will result in 

 a distinct gain to Australian zoological 

 science. There is yet much to be done 

 in the investigation of our marsupials, 

 and, along with our fellow citizens in 

 other parts of the Empire, surely our 

 American cousins have a right to share 

 in our heritage, for, in their land as in 



ours, there are still existing members 

 of the marsupial order of mammals so 

 characteristic of Australia. But we 

 may claim with justice that Australian 

 scientific collectors should obtain special 

 facilities and support in their work. 

 The resources of our own museums are 

 deplorably slender and it is to be hoped 

 that public-spirited men like Sir Wil- 

 liam Macleay, Sir Thomas Elder, W. A. 

 Horn, and Mr. H. L. White, will always 

 be forthcoming, men who realise the 

 necessity for the investigation of our 

 wild life, and are prepared to give prac- 

 tical support to the work. All honour 

 to them. 



Notes and News- 



Dr. J. R. M. Robertson, Trustee, has 

 returned to Sydney after an extended 

 trip to Europe and America. Another 

 Trustee, Sir James Burns, has riLso 

 returned from Europe . We are pleased 

 to hear that his health is now improving. 



Dr. T. Storie Dixson, President, left 

 last month on a trip to the LTnited 

 States. 



Mr. A. R. McCuUoch, who has l)een 

 away for five months with Captain 

 Hurley in New Guinea, has now re- 

 turned. 



Among recent scientific visitors 

 may be enumerated Professor P. B. 

 de Rautenfeld, Connnissioner, Chinese 

 Maritime Customs Service, formerly 

 of the University of Peking ; Mr. J. 

 Emblom Gullberg of the Smithsonian 

 Institution, Washington, who has re- 

 turned from New Guinea and is now 

 engaged in craniometric investigations 

 in the Museum ; Major H. Newport, 

 Department of Agriculture, Rabaul, 

 who is in charge of the mus?um there 

 and is keenly interested in museum 

 methods. 



Mr. H. C. Raven, collecting for the 

 American Museum of Natural History, 

 returned from Tasmania and later left 

 for the United States. Mr. Raven has 

 been successful in obtaining a fine 

 collection of Australian mammals for 

 anatomical purposes and for display in 

 the projected Australian Hall in the 

 New York museum. During his stay 

 in Sydney Mr. Raven made a careful 

 study of our collection of marsupial 

 skulls. 



Professor T. T. Flynn, of the Uni- 

 versity of Tasmania, recently spent 

 several weeks at the Museum, working 

 on the description of the squalodont 

 whale skull discovered by him at Table 

 Cape, Tasmania, and on the Mawson 

 Collection of Antarctic Pycnogonida. 

 A cast of the Table Ca]ie Skull has been 

 put on exhibition in the JNIuseuni, and 

 a description by Prof. Flynn of the find 

 and its significance will be published 

 in our next issue. 



The Museum lecture season will open 

 on April 12th, when Mr. A. R. Mc- 

 CuUoch will discourse on " The Mud 

 People of Papua." The lecture will be 

 illustrated by an exceptionally fine 

 series of lantern slides. 



