(i59) 



enclosed by an iron fence with vertical bars about 5 feet high. 

 This treatment has been found necessary there in order to 

 preserve the woodland and its undergrowth of wild plants. 

 I recommend the appointment of a committee to consider 

 this important question and report to the Board. 



Museums 



Work on the public museums has been chiefly directed 

 during the year to improving the arrangement of specimens, 

 to adding additional specimens to the groups already in- 

 stalled, to the preservation and care of the specimens and 

 to more complete labeling. Many plant products additional 

 to those already displayed were added to the economic 

 museum, and several exhibition cases were filled with sec- 

 tions of woods of West Indian trees collected on recent ex- 

 ploring trips. 



Miss Katherine E. French was employed in the spring to 

 prepare six wax models of flowering and fruiting branches 

 of plants; if funds were available it would be very desirable 

 to continue this work and secure a large number of such 

 models, their especial value being that as they are practi- 

 cally a reproduction of the appearance of the living plant, 

 flowers and fruits can be seen by the visiting public at all 

 times, independent of flowering and fruiting seasons. The 

 most satisfactory way of securing such a collection would 

 be to employ a modeler as a member of the staff who would 

 thus always be at hand to reproduce flowers and fruits at 

 the Garden, and who might also be sent to other points to 

 prepare models of plants not in the Garden collections. 



Herbarium 



The herbarium has been increased during the year by 

 about 26,000 specimens, and some additional cases have 

 been built by our carpenters. Much work has been given 

 by the curators to the study of these additional specimens 

 and to those incorporated in former years, so that the col- 

 lection, as a whole, has been much improved for reference. 



