President's Address. 117 



Six hundred more specimens from my African collection 

 were purchased, and the Godeffroy Museum presented 87 birds 

 from the Pacific Islands. 



The year 1878 witnessed the presentation of 163 birds from 

 Samoa and the Ellice Islands by the Rev. J. S. Whitmee 

 (cf. Sharpe, P.Z.S. 1878, pp. 436-447). 



One hundred and eighteen birds were collected in Argentina 

 and Uruguay, by Mr. Alan Peel, a friend of Dr. Günther. 



Mr. A. Bouvier had established a very successful Natural 

 History agency in Paris, and the Museum obtained from him 

 several new and interesting species from the Congo, collected 

 by Dr. Lucan and M. Petit, as well as some from Gaboon 

 collected by M. A. Marche and the ill-fated Marquis De 

 Compiégne. 



In this year, too, the Museum received from Professor 

 Alphonse Milne-Edwards a series of 308 birds from Cochin 

 China. These had been collected by Mons. E. Pierre, who had 

 wished that, after the first set had been retained for the 

 National Museum at Paris, the duplicates might be for- 

 warded to the British Museum, where they have been much 

 appreciated. 



One hundred and one birds and eggs from the north of 

 Greenland were presented by Colonel Peilden and Mr. H. C. 

 Hart, collected during the Arctic Expedition under Sir 

 George Nares in the "Alert" and " Discovery." 



One thousand and thirty-nine African Birds from ray 

 collection were purchased. Eighty-eight birds from Ceylon 

 were presented by Colonel Vincent Legge, and 121 from 

 Western Java by Mr. Francis Nicholson. 



A very noteworthy addition to the collection in 1878 was 

 the first set of birds procured by Dr. Otto Finsch dining his 

 celebrated expedition to Western Siberia. 



In 1879 the final dispersion of the collections of the old 

 Indian Museum commenced. From the days of the East 

 India Company, when the Museum was at the Company's 

 House in Leadenhall Street, the collections had been moved 

 to other places, and finally packed away. They contained the 

 results of the work of Horsfield, Sykes, and many other well- 

 known men, and contained many types of Indian species. 



