EEPOKT OF ASSISTANT DIRECTOR. 53 



of the bulk aud weight of the specimens — as to be beyond the scope of the ordinary- 

 collector, and in too little demand to be found in many of the natural history stores. 

 I might mention such examples as fault structure, examples of folds, contortion, false 

 bedding, &c., "which can scarcely be obtained by other than the means suggested." 



(c) Department of Metallurgy and Economic Geology. 



At the openiug of the year the curator, Mr. P. P. Dewey, was still 

 detained at II^Tew Orleans arranging the collection which had been sent 

 from his department to the exposition, and he did not return to Wash- 

 ington till the middle of January. The design of the collections of this 

 department was to show, as far as the time and means at disposal would 

 jjermit, the prominent occurrences of each metal, the methods of ab- 

 stracting the metals from their ores, and the utilization of the metals. 

 To these were added a few illustrations of non-metallic ores and their 

 utilization, including a very extensive and valuable illustration of the 

 coal industry. Most of the ore material was selected from the Museum 

 collection, and only a very few new collections were made. These lat- 

 ter were selected upon a systematic plan, representing the mine as 

 a unit. In the plan adopted, specimens were taken to represent sec- 

 tions across and up and down the vein, and to show an average of the 

 product of the vein, while to these were added the walls and other in- 

 teresting material. In representing the abstraction and utilization of 

 the metals, it was the design to begin with the ore as it leaves the 

 mine, and to follow it through the various steps in all the operations 

 to the production, of the finished article, showing, when possible, every 

 material going into each operation and every product of each operation. 

 In the case of coal, the collections were based largely on the ethnological 

 aspects of the qu^^tion, and thus included many specimens aside from 

 those of an econ(JBiic or geological value. 



Throughout the new collections of the department special attention 

 has been paid to gathering as full and complete a description of every- 

 thing shown as possible, while the pictorial side of the question has 

 been treated very elaborately, and includes some views of the interior 

 of a coal mine taken by electric light, the first views of the kind ever 

 taken. These collections form a basis for a full and complete repre- 

 sentation of the mineral resources of the country, and it is hoped that 

 they will increase until they shall fill their highest educational value. 

 They have been fully described in Museum Circular No. 31. The regu- 

 lar force of the department having been reduced to a scientific assist- 

 ant and a laborer, the work of preparing the collections in the Museum 

 has been at a comparative standstill during the first- half of the year. 

 The laboratory of this department has been moved to the second floor 

 of the south-west pavilion, and the work-room on the floor of the Mu- 

 seum has been cleaned out and space prepared for exhibition purposes, 

 so that now the entire work of preparing material for exhibition has 

 been concentrated into one place. The work of investigating the New 



