EEPORT ON THE SCIENTIFIC EXHIBIT. 



DEPT. E.-MINES AND MINING. 



By FREDERICK J. H. MERRILL, PH. D., Superintbndbkt. 



At the request of the Board of Managers of the Exhibit of the State 

 of 'New York at the World's Cokimbian Exposition, it was voted by 

 the Eegents of the University, September 29, 1892, to jjlace the scien- 

 tific exhibit of New York State at the World's Fair in charge of the 

 New York State Museum, and the task of preparing this exhibit was 

 assigned to the assistant director. In this exhibit the attainment of two 

 objects was aimed at : First, to make as exhaustive a display as possible 

 of the natural economic resources of the State, and, second, to show 

 the collections derived by loan from the State Museum, and those 

 secured directly by purchase in the method, of grouping and arrange- 

 ment employed by the best equipped inuseums of this country or 

 Europe, and in the most suitable exhibition cases. In short, it was 

 desired to show the public a museum modeled after the best in this 

 country and Europe, in which, by the limitation of the case, the speci- 

 mens were all derived from New York State, to show the economic 

 resources of New York, and to instruct objectively all who visited the 

 exhibit. 



The work of the State Museum is carried on imder six principal 

 heads, paleontology, economic geology and mineralogy, botany, zoology 

 and entomology ; the exhibit of the museum would, therefore, natu- 

 rally have been on these lines, and was so carried out wherever it was 

 possible. In the minds of scientists of this country and of Europe, 

 the name of the New York State Museum has for many years been 

 closely associated with that of Dr. James Hall, the State Geologist. , In 

 the preparation of his monumental works on the paleontology of New 

 York, the museum grew, and with its growth was that work of pub- 

 lication which for scientific accuracy, logical arrangement, careful and 

 artistic illustration cannot be equalled in the world. The well-known 

 volumes on paleontology which were exhibited, are in themselves a 

 library of the subject, and the great number of valuable plates which 

 they contain form a comprehensive exhibit of the paleontological 

 specimens in the State Museum. In addition was exhibited the Colioes 

 mastodon, a unique and almost perfect specimen. At the time the work 

 was placed in charge of the assistant director of the museum, the State 

 Botanist had already begun his work. In the judgment of Professor 

 Peck it was considered desirable to make a selection of some one group, 

 and an exhaustive presentation thereof. He selected the fungi upon 

 which he had for a long time been working, and in relation to which 

 he had made many interesting discoveries of economic value. His 



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