8 REPORT OF THE SECRETARY. 



printed, as have also those of Drs. Billings and Mitchell. The valuable 

 researches of the latter gentlemen are being continued under an addi- 

 tional grant. 



The subscription for the Astronomical Journal has been continued. 



EXPLORATIONS. 



The Institution has continued to carry on ethnological and natural 

 history explorations during the year, to which reference is made in the 

 reports of the Bureau of Ethnology. I may call special attention to 

 the explorations among the cliff dwellings of Arizona by Dr. Fewkes, 

 and in the territory of the Seri Indians in Mexico by Mr. McGee, as 

 also on the western coast of Florida by F. H. Cushing, where abundant 

 relics of the prehistoric age were discovered. Dr. William L. Abbott 

 has continued his contributions of natural history and ethnological 

 specimens collected by him in Africa and Asia. 



PUBLICATIONS. 



The publications of the Institution include the Contributions to 

 Knowledge, the Miscellaneous Collections, and the Annual Beports, the 

 first two being printed at the expense of the Institution, while the 

 reports are Government documents. Various publications are also 

 issued by the National Museum and the Bureau of Ethnology, to which 

 allusion is elsewhere made. 



Contributions to Knowledge. — Three volumes of the Contributions 

 were completed during the year, and two separate memoirs. Volumes 

 XXX and XXXI were the text and plates of an exhaustive illustrated 

 work by Dr. G. Brown Goode and Dr. Tarleton H. Bean, entitled 

 "Oceanic ichthyology," being a treatise on the deep-sea and pelagic 

 fishes of the world. 



Volume XXXII, on "Life histories of North American birds, parrots 

 to grackles," by Maj. Charles Bendire, IT. S. A., is a second contribu- 

 tion on this subject, the first volume, including gallinaceous birds, 

 pigeons or doves, and birds of prey, having been published by the 

 Institution several years ago. 



The memoir by Prof. E. W. Morley on the density of oxygen and 

 hydrogen was published early in the year in a volume of 117 pages, 

 and has been reprinted in full in Zeitschrift fur Physikalische Chemie, 

 a duplicate set of blocks of the illustrations having been sent to the 

 publishers at their request. In this memoir Professor Morley describes 

 in detail the methods employed in his investigations and illustrates 

 the apparatus employed. The atomic weight of oxygen was studied 

 by two methods: (1) The synthesis of water, in which he achieved com- 

 pleteness by actually weighing the hydrogen, the oxygen, and the water 

 formed; and (2) by the density ratio between oxygen and hydrogen. 

 By both methods he reached the same result: 0=15.879, with variation 

 in the fourth decimal place as between the two. 



The results of the investigation by Drs. Billings, Mitchell, and 



