REPORT OF THE SECRETARY. 7 



lions in the field or to maintain a corps of collectors, it is compelled 

 to concentrate its efforts on special work of limited scope, but of 

 such a character that the results shall, as far as possible, have an 

 immediate bearing on the progress of science. In recent years, as 

 in the whole of its past history, the Institution has had the aid of 

 public-spirited citizens and the cooperation of other institutions 

 and of the several branches of the United States Government. It 

 has, in turn, cooperated with other organizations in the explora- 

 tions which they have conducted, being itself benefited thereby and 

 benefiting those with which it has been associated. 



In recent years opportunities have been afforded for participating 

 in a number of exploring and hunting expeditions organized by 

 private enterprise, whereby scientific collections of great importance 

 have been obtained. These collections, with those from other sources, 

 are preserved in the National Museum for exhibition to the public 

 or for promoting scientific studies. 



The field of these activities of the Institution has been world-wide, 

 but attention has been recently concentrated on Africa and the 

 Panama Canal Zone rather more than on other regions. 



STUDIES IX CAMBRIAN GEOLOGY AND PALEONTOLOGY. 



During the field season of the fiscal year 1911-12, or the spring and 

 summer of 1912, I continued the collecting of Cambrian fossils from 

 the famous fossil locality above Burgess Pass, north of Field, British 

 Columbia, on the main line of the Canadian Pacific Railway, for the 

 first two weeks of July and three weeks in September. 



On the way to the Canadian Northwest I stopped off for a few days 

 to examine the locality on Steep Rock Lake, 140 miles west of Port 

 Arthur, where the oldest pre-Cambrian fossiliferous rocks occur. I 

 had made a small collection, when, by the swamping of the canoe in 

 which we were working in the rapids of the Seine River, a short dis- 

 tance from the lake, Dr. J. W. Truman, my guide and fellow geolo- 

 gist, of the Canadian Survey, was drowned, and the work thus most 

 unfortunately brought to a close. 



Outfitting at Fitzhugh, on the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway, I 

 went with a well-equipped party over the Yellowhead Pass on the 

 Continental Divide, leaving the line of the railway at Moose River, 

 IT miles west of the Pass. The Moose River was followed up to its 

 head at Moose Pass, where we passed over into the drainage of the 

 Smoky River, making several camps en route. The final camp was 

 made at Robson Pass, between Berg and Adolphus Lakes. A recon- 

 naissance of the geological section from Moose Pass to the summit of 

 Mount Robson gave approximately 12,000 feet in thickness of the 

 Cambrian formations and 3,000 feet of Lower Ordovician strata. 

 Fossil beds were found at several localities in this section, and one 



