BRITISH MUSEUM (NATURAL HISTORY) 17 



In the Department of Mineralogy a discovery of some importance to 

 egyptologists, that scarabs were composed of baked talc, was made by 

 X-ray methods. A new palladium arsenide from Minas Greraes, Brazil, 

 was established by X-ray examination and chemical analysis, and certain 

 deep-sea crystals were found by similar means to be identical with renal 

 calcium oxalate crystals. X-ray photographs of the j^ellow incrustation 

 on bismuthinite, formerly labelled bismutite, showed it to be cubic 

 bismuth oxide. Investigations were carried out on the so-called tantalite 

 crystals from Uganda, and Mr. Arthur Champion's comprehensive 

 collection of rocks from Northern Turkana, Kenya Colony, was further 

 examined. The curious mineral pharmaceutical series in the Sir Hans 

 Sloane collection was examined, and the investigation of the origin of 

 ancient Roman marbles and other stones was continued. 



The work in the Department of Botany during the past year consisted 

 largely in the naming and incorporation of collections and the re-arrange- 

 ment of specimens in accordance Avith recent monographs. Collections 

 from the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, the Gulf of Guinea, Ruwenzori, Tibet, 

 Greenland, and Siam were studied, and monographic investigations of 

 the Podostemacese, and oi Combretum, Polygonum, Magnolia and Selaginella 

 were continued. 



Congresses, etc. 



The Earl of Crawford and Balcarres, K.T., F.R.S., and Mr. J. 

 Ramsbottom, O.B.E., represented the Trustees at the celebrations of 

 the tercentenary of the Museum National d'Histoire Naturelle, held in 

 Paris in June, when an illuminated address from the Trustees and staff 

 of the British Museum (Natural History) was presented. Dr. G. F. 

 Herbert Smith and Dr. W. T. Caiman, C.B., F.R.S., attended, as represen- 

 tatives of the Museum, the Annual Conference of the Museums Association 

 in Brussels in July. Dr. H. D. Thomas attended the Annual Conference 

 of the South Eastern Union of Scientific Societies at Bournemouth in 

 June ; Mr. A. C. Townsend was the Museum delegate at the Annual 

 Conference of the Library Association at Manchester in September, and 

 at the Annual Conference of the Association of Special Libraries and 

 Information Bureaux at Cambridge in the same month. Dr. W. T. 

 Caiman and Mr. N. D. Riley represented His Majesty's Government and 

 the Trustees at the Twelfth International Congress of Zoology at Lisbon, 

 and Mr. Riley also at the Sixth International Entomological Congress 

 at Madrid, both in September. Mr. J. Ramsbottom represented the 

 Museum and was also a Government delegate at the Sixth International 

 Botanical Congress at Amsterdam in September. 



The Director and several members of the scientific staff attended the 

 meeting of the British Association at Norwich in September. 



Advisory and Economic Activities. 



Mr. J. Ramsbottom, O.B.E., was invited to serve as a British representa- 

 tive on an " International Committee " formed to help in the management 

 of the Centraalbureau von Schimmelcultures, and Mr. N. B. Kinnear was 

 appointed a member of the Estates Committee of the National Trust, 

 to advise on natural history matters. 



