1839] " Report on the Museum of the Asiatic Society.'' 421 



Museum ; for this, as I left it,* I am answerable, and to Dr. Jameson's 

 notes upon it I shall briefly reply, in the order of his remarks. 



Mammalia. — Dr. Jameson states that " many of the specimens of 

 Mammalia are exceedingly good ; but others, from their bad condition, 

 require to be replaced as soon as possible." I believe the good speci- 

 mens are for the most part those procured and set up either by myself 

 or under my superintendence. The bad ones are what were in the 

 Museum before I took charge, and were in a most miserable state, 

 as may be seen from my first annual Report. I left them in the 

 Museum only till better could be procured, on the principle that a bad 

 •specimen is better than none. 



Birds. — Of the 600 birds mentioned by Dr. Jameson, about 360 

 were procured and prepared by my exertions— many of them shot by 

 myself ; of the rest I err but little if I say, the greater part would never 

 have reached the Society's Museum, if I had not taken measures, 

 hereafter to be mentioned, for their collection. Of those prepared in 

 ray time I have copious notes, and the greater portion of a catalogue 

 made, which is enriched by observations on the manners and habits of 

 the Indian birds by Mr. C. W. Smith. This I did intend to finish, so 

 soon as I could get a little respite from the incessant occupation 

 incidental to the wandering and anxious life I have led since I left 

 Calcutta, would allow ; and I shall be happy to do so as soon as possi- 

 ble, if the Society wish it. In the enumeration of new and rare speci- 

 mens Dr. Jameson omits the newest and rarest of them all, viz. the 

 Halcyon amauropterus, mihi, which I discovered, and the Eurim- 

 rynchus griseus, of which but one other specimen is known.f 



* I say as I left it, because the Editors of the Journal in a note appended to Dr. 

 Jameson's Report say, that since his departure, short as the time has been, the minerals 

 he arranged have been "swept into chaos by the unguarded hands of Assistants.'' 

 As nearly two years have elapsed since I was Curator, during which the Museum had 

 been in charge of a Committee and two Curators before Dr. Jameson ; surely some 

 allowance might have been made for Dr. Jameson's "predecessors" on the same 

 score; especially as from the utter failure of the Committee to fulfil the office proper- 

 ly, the whole management was probably left in their time to the " unguarded hands of 

 Assistants'* only. I think the excuse might have been made for us ; not I trust that 

 I need it, but in common fairness. 



f As every one with any pretensions to ornithological knowledge is acquainted 

 with the rareness of this bird, I fear from Dr. Jameson's silence, it has been lost to, or 

 abstracted from, the Museum. I hope the Secretaries will inquire into this ; for it is 

 unquestionably the most valuable ornithological specimen we have. (!) 



(1) Dr. Pearson's note. — We have made the suggested inquiry of Dr. M'Clelland, 

 who replies thus, 



" The Museum is at present in such confusion owing to the repairs of the house, that 

 it is impossible to say what is in it, and besides all the tickets have fallen off the 

 birds from damp, as they appear to have been merely fastened with glue." — Eds. 



