Page Thirteen 



Xanu' wisluvs to oxpross his thanks to those who assisted in securing 

 nionilHM-s and to those wlio sui)i)orte(l the work by their subscriptions. 



Progress is being made in the Department of Ornithology on the 

 work of rearrangement of the bird collections. Up to the present, the 

 l)irds secured on each of the .South American expeditions have been 

 kejit separate from each other and from the old general collection which 

 dates back fifteen years. As a result, there were some eighteen separate 

 groups. All these are now being combined into one large collection, 

 which is divided into a first and second series, the first series consisting 

 of a pair of each species and subspecies, and the second series comprising 

 the balance of material. The object is of course to facilitate and expedite 

 the comparison and identification of new material. This piece of work, 

 which was begun last June, will probabh' take up the best part of a year. 



Mr. Maunsell S. Crosby, of Rhinebeck, New York, is assisting Dr. 

 Dwight. 



The Museum's sick list for December was rather long. Among the 

 employees whom colds and other illness kept away for a few days were 

 Miss Greene, Miss Marks, Mrs. Ziska, Mr. Foulke, Mr. Coleman and 

 Dr. Fisher. 



Dr. Ernest Skeats, Professor of Geology in the University of Mel- 

 bourne, visited the Museum twice during December. Dr. Reeds took 

 him through several exhibition halls and to Mr. Akeley's studio. Dr. 

 Skeats, who is a petrologist, is making a tour of the universities and mu- 

 seums of this country and of Canada, and making the acquaintance of 

 fellow-members of his profession. It is interesting to note that some of 

 his students of the University of Melbourne who were sent to Africa on 

 various commissions discovered some manganese beds which proved 

 very valuable during the war, as the insurrections in India had cut off 

 that country as a source of supply of this valuable commodity. 



The offices of the Department of Anthropology have just been re- 

 painted. 



