6 



Biological Laboratory and the Museum Tables at the United 

 States Fish Commission Station at Wood's Holl, for which the 

 Museum is specially indebted to Colonel Macdonald, U. S. Fish 

 Commissioner. 



The usual amount of material from our collections has been 

 sent for study to a number of specialists. The customary ex- 

 changes have been continued, and are mentioned in the special 

 Reports of the Assistants. Professors Scott and Osborne have 

 continued their work on our American Fossil Vertebrates, and 

 another part of their report is nearly ready for publication. 



Among our principal accessions I may mention a skeleton of 

 a Right Whale, finely mounted by Ward, and now hung from 

 the ceiling of the large room devoted to the Systematic Collection 

 of Vertebrates. This skeleton was originally secured for the 

 Museum by the late Captain N. E. Atwood, of Provincetown, 

 where the whale had been thrown ashore. In the early days of 

 my Natural History career, I had the unpleasant task of assisting 

 in the preparation of the skeleton. 



We have made interesting purchases of Alcoholic Reptiles 

 for the Exhibition Rooms. 



Through Professor Ward we have secured a series of valu- 

 able skeletons of a few of the large fossil Mammals of the 

 Pampas in sufficiently good state of preservation to be mounted 

 and placed on exhibition in the Tertiary Room. A number of 

 mounted specimens have likewise been received from him to fill 

 gaps in our Exhibition Rooms, as well as a number of casts of 

 Pacific Islanders and other aborigines for the Faunal Rooms. 



We have purchased also the continuation of the series of casts 

 of Stegocephali from Dr. Anton Fritsch, of Prague, and casts 

 of Phenacodus and Hyracotherium from Professor Cope. 



From Lieutenant Moser, U. S. N., we have received an in- 

 teresting collection of corals, taken from a cable laid off Key 

 West in 1881, and taken up in 1888. I hope soon to publish 

 an account of these corals, illustrating as they do the rate of 

 growth of several species. 



From Mr. Charles Wachsmuth was received a fine slab of Cri- 

 noids from the Kinderhook bed of Legrand, Marshall Co., Iowa. 



We have also received a model of the Pacific Coast of the 

 United States, prepared under the direction of Professor Davidson 

 of the U. S. Coast Survey. 



