BRITISH MUSEUM (NATURAL HISTORY). 55 



Altogether 1,488 title-slips have been written, 68 rewritten, 

 and 1,934 revised (independently of those prepared for printing). 



There are now, on a rough estimate, 101,806 volumes (exclusive 

 of continuations and minor separata) and 6,250 maps in the whole 

 building. 



The number of visits paid to the General Library during the 

 year by students and others (irrespective of the staff and persons 

 to whom the use of a key is granted) was 1,681. 



Donations have been received from a great number of Museums, 

 Academies, and other corporate bodies, as well as from personal 

 donors. 



The printing of the Supplement to the Library Catalogue has 

 been begun, the whole of letter "A" has been set up in type and 

 has been printed off as far as "ALMQ." 



Index Generum et Specierum Animalium. 



During the year considerable progress has been made with this 

 Index, under Mr. C. Davies Sherborn's charge, and some 35,000 

 slips have been compiled and incorporated. 



The manuscript has been continuously and extensively consulted 

 during the past year by the staff and students, whilst many 

 enquiries have been answered by Mr. Sherborn in correspondence. 



The recording for the year has been principally done from the 

 journals of Academies and from periodical publications, with a view 

 to the convenience of consultants, and the Index is now in an 

 advanced state, having been carried out as far as the letter " T." 



Index Museum. 



All the dissections exhibited in the Hall that are mounted in 

 preservative fluid were inspected during the year, and several have 

 been resealed and others refilled. 



An explanatory guide-book to the specimens and models of 

 disease-spreading insects and ticks exhibited in the Hall was issued 

 in January. The pamphlet, which is to a large extent a compilation 

 of the labels that are attached to the specimens displayed, redrafted 

 in such a manner that they read consecutively, consists of forty-five 

 pages and is illustrated by fourteen text-figures. 



A series of drawings, enlarged and of actual size, of insects that 

 lay their eggs in the puparia of tsetse-flies was mounted for exhibition 

 in the early part of the year. These insects, from the fact that they 

 prevent the development of the tsetse-flies in the puparia thus para- 

 sitised, tend to reduce the numbers of tsetse-flies occurring in a 

 district, and to limit the spread of sleeping-sickness and other 

 diseases of trypanosome origin, such as " nagana," and are con- 

 sequently to be regarded as beneficial. 



In connection with a notice issued by the military authorities 

 forbidding the shooting of carrier-pigeons, a series of three typical 

 carrier-pigeons has been mounted, together with specimens of other 



