' 
REPORT. 
To THE PRESIDENT AND FELLOWS OF HARVARD COLLEGE: — 
I HAVE the pleasure of reporting that during the past year the 
latest addition to the Museum building has been completed. The 
transfer of the students to their new quarters has been effected, 
and the whole building is now occupied as originally planned. 
The rooms in this addition are devoted mainly to Laboratories, to 
the Library, Lecture-Room, and Curator’s Room, only such space 
being reserved for exhibition as was necessary to connect the 
general exhibition-rooms with those of the main body of the 
building, hereafter to be erected. 
Ten years wanting only a few weeks have passed since the 
care of the Museum devolved upon me. Some account is due 
here of the work done during that decade, and of the present 
state of the Museum as compared with its condition at the close 
of 1873. At that time, and indeed far earlier, from the very 
beginning of the institution, the general plan was sketched out in 
the mind of its founder. But the difficulties involved in the 
initiation of so large an undertaking prevented Professor Agassiz 
from developing his schemes. From want of rooms and of means 
for proper distribution, the immense accessions constantly accu- 
mulating upon his hands invaded, little by little, the space devoted 
to special objects. It became evident, at the time of his death, 
that nothing short of a radical rearrangement of the collections 
could bring out his plans and give them distinct expression. This 
rearrangement has been completed only within the past year, and 
no sign of the former confusion, due to a too rapid accumulation 
of material, is left. 
At the close of 1873 the Museum building covered about 9,400 
square feet of ground, and was filled to overflowing, from attic 
to basement, with the collections brought together by its first 
Director. The buildings and collections then represented an 
expenditure of about $200,000. From that time to the past 
