158 [Assembly, 



prized in all museums where scientific investigation is carried on 

 as well as in colleges and schools where studies are made in palaeon- 

 tology. I would, therefore, recommend that the matter of the 

 disposition of our duplicate collections be carefully considered, and 

 that they should be bestowed only where we have a reasonable 

 assurance that they will be useful and will also be preserved. To 

 have arrived at a point where we can distribute a hundred species 

 of authentically labeled fossils has cost much money, time and 

 earnest labor, and they should only be bestowed with due care 

 and consideration. 



The extensive collections of fossils made by the State Geologist 

 and his assistants from the years 1856 to 1866, for the illustra- 

 tion of the Palaeontology of New York, have, for want of space 

 elsewhere, remained in private buildings belonging to him. The 

 law of 1883 authorized the incorporation of these collections with 

 those of the State Museum proper, and at the same time provided 

 that the whole should be transferred to the State Hall as the rooms 

 in that building should become vacated by the removal of the State 

 officers. Pursuant to this plan a portion of the upper story of the 

 State Hall was fitted up for the reception of the collections of 

 corals and other fossils, and during the present year (1886) the 

 greater part of all the specimens have been removed from the 

 premises where they had been kept, and are now arranged in 

 the State Hall. For this purpose additional drawers were required, 

 and these were supplied from the stock of drawers which the 

 specimens occupied while in the custody of the State Geologist. 

 There are now more than 3,500 drawers arranged in the State Hall 

 and occupied or to be occupied by the collections. Three rooms 

 on the second floor of the building have been fitted up as offices for 

 the director of the museum and assistants and for the State Botan- 

 ist, with the library and herbarium. 



Owing to the necessity of removing these large collections to the 

 State Hall and their arrangement in a systematic order, the time 

 of the author and his assistants in the palaeontology was given to 

 this work for several months, and this, with other duties connected 

 with this transfer of material, has seriously interfered with the 

 progress of the palaeontology. The greater part of the time of 

 Mr. C. E. Beecher since the beginning of May, 1886, has been 

 taken up with the work of rearranging the collections in the State 



