64 Asiatic Society. [No. 109. 



The Officiating Curator having been requested to furnish his Report on the fore- 

 going papers, submitted the following : — 



H. W. Torrens, Esq. 



Secretary, Asiatic Society. 



Sir, 



In obedience to the desire of the Committee of Papers, confirmed by the Society 

 at its meeting of the 5th instant, I have the honour to submit my report on the 

 matters relative to the Museum, forming the subject of the letter of the Honorable 

 the Court of Directors, No. 17 of 1840, under date 16th September, 1840, and that 

 of the Society to the Government of India, General Department, transmitting the 

 former to you, date 31st December 1840. For more distinct explanation, it may 

 be convenient to state what these matters are : — 



I. — The relation in which the Society now stands towards the Honorable the 

 Court. 



II. — Inquiry for various collections assumed to have been detained at the Society's 

 rooms : especially those of Dr. Helfer and Capt. Pemberton. 



III. — The assistance which may be afforded by the Society to facilitate the early 

 dispatch of collections made by Government Officers. 



IV. — Assistance which may be afforded by the Society towards the completion 

 of the Honorable Court's Museum. 



The feeling of the Society, and my own views on this head, are, I submit, 



I. The relation in which the "\ fully expressed by the Resolution which I had the 

 Society now stands towards > honor to propose, and which was unanimously carried 

 the Honorable the Court. J at the j anuary me eting of 1841, (see Journal No. 105, 



p. 943,) and which for ready reference, I copy here. 



" The Officiating Curator reported, that a considerable number of duplicate 

 specimens, principally of birds, &c. were available for transmission to Europe ; and 

 he moved, — that as many specimens of great interest to Naturalists might be collected, 

 prepared and sent to England at a small expence, it was worthy the attention of 

 the Society, whether such might not be prepared and sent to the Honorable the 

 Court of Directors, as due to them from the Society." 



The Society therein adopting this resolution, has fully testified its earnest 

 desire to acknowledge, in every possible way which can tend to the general advance- 

 ment of science, the liberal assistance which the Honorable the Court has been 

 pleased to extend to it. I may also here, perhaps, refer to my report for the past 

 month, (approved by the Society), in which, after proposing a second dispatch of 

 duplicates to the Honorable the Court, I have ventured further to suggest to their 

 Curator, how we can mutually assist each other, as follows : — 



" I may suggest here, that we point out to the Curator of the Museum of the Honor- 

 able the Court of Directors the great facility with which, if approved of by the Court, 

 he might procure in exchange for such specimens as he already possesses, some of the 

 many which we require for the Museum of Economic Geology. It is scarcely possi- 

 ble to send home a skin of a bird, a skeleton, or a scull from India, for which some 

 duplicate may not be obtained in exchange, which would be of utility to us here." 



