1875.] 



SENATE— No. 75. 



5 



tion of Dr. Loew, of Guben, which has now become the 

 property of the Museum, and contains the best collection of 

 American diptera in existence. The biological collection of 

 insects has also been increased by the purchase of a very large 

 collection of Dr. Rosenhauer, of Erlangen. The late Mr. 

 Crotch was engaged for a part of the past year on the collec- 

 tion of coleoptera ; important accessions had been secured 

 from his Californian collections, but his death has deprived 

 the Museum of this material. 



The alcoholic collections were never in as good a condition, 

 nor as accessible, as at the present moment. The storage in 

 copper cans, commenced three years ago, is now completed, 

 and, from experience, it is evident that nothing, in the end, 

 will stand the test of time as well for the preservation of 

 bulky alcoholic collections as copper cans with metallic screw 

 tops. Thanks to the happy suggestion of D. F. Becker, a 

 very important progress has been made in ultimately securing 

 the safety of the insect biological collections kept in small 

 glass vials, to which reference is made in Dr. Hagen's report. 



Mr. Garman has very successfully adopted the card sys- 

 tem, in use in libraries, for the purpose of showing the geo- 

 graphical range, and the material on hand of each species. 

 These cards of species advantageously replace the faunal 

 and systematic sheets introduced by Professor Agassiz, 

 which, like all fixed sheets, were not capable of indefinite 

 expansion. 



The publications of the past year were limited to the issue 

 of Part lY. of the Revision of the Echini, by Alex. Agassiz, 

 and the first part of the Scientific Results of the Hassler 

 Expedition, by Messrs. Agassiz and Pourtales. Considerable 

 progress has also been made to the preparation of the plates 

 for a first part of the catalogue of the Agassiz Collection of 

 Fishes, by Mr. Putnam. 



The Museum has made provisions for the room needed by 

 the College for the instruction in zoology and geology. The 

 instruction in zoology has been for the past year in charge of 

 Professor McCrady, assisted by Mr. Walter Faxon in the 

 laboratory work. The advanced students have worked at 

 the Museum under Professor McCrady's charge. 



The present term the instruction in geology has been 



