72 Report of the President 



South American birds; two papers by Assistant Curator 

 Miller describing several new genera of birds, and notes on 

 Ptilosis; the first of a series on Congo birds by Assistant 

 Chapin, and three papers by the Curator on South American 

 mammals. The paper in the Memoirs, by Assistant Curator 

 Andrews and Dr. Schulte, on the Sei Whale, comprises about 

 200 pages of text, 31 plates and 48 text figures. 



EXTINCT VERTEBRATES 

 DEPARTMENT OF VERTEBRATE PALAEONTOLOGY 



Henry Fairfield Osborn, Curator Emeritus; W. D. Matthew, Curator 



The field work of the department this year was limited to 

 a single expedition by Mr. Barnum Brown, continuing his 



campaign in the Cretaceous dinosaur beds of 

 Expeditions Alberta. The exceptional success of this party 



in 1914 was noted in last year's report. During 

 the 1915 season another fine series of specimens was secured; 

 while not equal in value to the previous year's collection, it 

 contains a number of fine skulls and more or less complete 

 skeletons. The most remarkable perhaps is a new type of 

 armored dinosaur, the teeth of which, found occasionally in 

 the Cretaceous formations, were named Palceoscincus by Leidy 

 fifty years ago, but the animal had remained otherwise 

 unknown until Mr. Brown's discovery of a fine skull and jaws 

 with the greater part of the skeleton. 



The skeleton of Tyrannosaurus has been completed and, 



for the present, stands in the center of the Hall of the Age of 



^ . ., . Man, as there is not room for it in the Dinosaur 

 New Exhibits —.„„,..'., . , ,. . , .. • 



Hall. This skeleton is the finest single exhibit 



in the department; its mounting technique is considered excep- 

 tionally good, and of its kind unequaled; and the scientific 

 value and popular interest are enhanced by the extreme rarity 

 of these skeletons, their gigantic size and the fierce and 

 predatory character of the animal. 



A second skeleton of a carnivorous dinosaur from the 

 Alberta Cretaceous, Ornithomimus, is of widely contrasted type 



