Brandon Printing Co. Nashville 
S.i.. PATTERSON, 
SSiOMEft C)F AGRICULTURE 
li^D IMMteRATION. 
RUNER, SECRETARY. 
k KILGORE, 
E CHEMIST. 
LEY, CU RATO R J 
EfVlUSEUM. 
TAIT B U TLE R, State Veteri narian . 
FRANKLIN SHERMAN.State fntomo]ogist. 
GERALD McCarthy, Botanist and BioloqisI 
W. N. HUTT Horticulturist. 
RALEIGH, APril 18, 1908. 
Dear Doctor Truej 
1 hav® your favor of the 17th inst* Begarding fossil ceta- 
ceans froin this gtata j would say that we hairs a few specimens in 
the imsewn that were here "before i took charge and of m^hich the iden^ 
tity is somewhat uncertain* In Kerrs Geology of north Carolina^ vol^ 
1, appears a description of a new species, Mesoterus Kerrianus* Cope^ 
and of that we have (or^ rather^ I think these specimens refer to 
this species) a. ba,sal piece of one mandible and two or three verte« 
brae* I am under the ii!5)ressi©n that the larger fragments from ?ihich 
this Bpecimen m-as identified were sent to the ^Tat1lonal -^ms^nm. by 
my predecessor, Thos* C# Harris, about 1894* ¥e have thretother verte- 
brae that I think are those described by Cope on pag© 49 of Appendix 
of the abo¥8 Mentioned work* 
PreTious to my connection with the Museum in 1895 there was 
quite a large and Taritd, collection of fossils in the imseum hut 
- 
from lack of care and cataloguing most of the labels had been either 
lost. or eaten off the specimens by insects and the indentitjiof many t 
of then IciEt^ wost of them are still packed aii'ay Imrm but in the 
absence of any locality labelsi their usefullness is not what it 
otherwise might have been^ ' 
Yours ¥erj trul 
Curator. 
