20 Report of the President 



great city. The influence and inspiration of this scientific 

 work are spread through the daily press, which everywhere 

 is disposed to treat the work of the Museum more carefully 

 and seriously, also through lectures and circulating collec- 

 tions to more than a million school children, and through the 

 displays in the exhibition halls, which during the past year 

 attracted nearly one million visitors. 



The activities of our field parties, under the leadership of 

 members of our able and courageous exploring staff, extended 

 to three of the great continents. In all there were twenty- 

 one field parties at work: one in Africa, two in South 

 America and eighteen in North America. 



AFRICA 



First in importance is the Congo Expedition which under 

 the leadership of Messrs. Lang and Chapin has been brought 



_ to a successful conclusion. This expedition has 



Congo , , , . . ■ 



Expedition keen °P eratln g for more than six years in the 

 Belgian Congo, and has secured important and 

 valuable collections of mammals, birds, reptiles, fishes and 

 invertebrates, as well as anthropological material. The 

 entire collection comprises more than 20,000 vertebrates and 

 more than 65,000 invertebrates. The descriptive catalogue 

 exceeds 3,500 pages, and other scientific data include 7,000 

 photographs which have been provided by Mr. Lang person- 

 ally. While the expedition enjoyed the hearty support of the 

 Belgian government and of all the Belgian officials, its remark- 

 able success is due in large measure to the very efficient man- 

 agement and painstaking work of Mr. Lang and Mr. Chapin. 



SOUTH AMERICA 



The ornithological survey of the Andean region of South 

 America, in which the Museum has been intensively engaged 



during the past three years, has been continued 

 Roosevelt through the contributions of Colonel Theodore 



Expeditions Roosevelt and Mr. Cleveland H. Dodge. 



Working under this grant, Mr. Leo E. Miller 

 and Mr. Howarth S. Boyle have made important collections 

 in Colombia and Bolivia, which have added nearly 2,000 



