Those who have taken interest in the development of this 
marvelous collection will be pleased to learn, from an 
$ 
anno vine ement by Mr. Freer, that considerable headwsiy has 
recently been made in the preparation of classified records of 
the oriental subjects, which entail researches, and the catalogue 
as they are finished and published will be found to contain 
important contributions to knowledge. A number of experts have 
rendered help in the various branches, and in the Chinese 
department, which is the most difficult from every point of 
view, assistance is being sought from experienced students in 
Europe and the Far East, as well as in /unerica. 
Mr. Frederick <V* Gookin, of the .art Institute of Chicago, 
and his assistants have completed the descriptive catalogue 
of the Jax)anese paintings; Mr. Langdon Warner, of Boston, 
has catalogued the Chinese and Japanese wood ant stone 
sculptures; while Mr. Dana H. Carroll, of New York, has 
catalogued the Mesopotamian and Corean potteries and is now 
engaged with the Japanese potteries. Mr. Laurence Binyon, 
of the British Museum, has given important aid in connection 
with the Chinese paintings, one of which has already been 
made the subject of a descriptive paper soon to be published. 
Prof. Edmund Trelawny Backhouse, the eminent English-Chinese 
scholar, of Kings College, London, while helping to secure 
specimens for the collection, is also deciding difficult 
problems in Chinese chirography. Dr. Berthold Laufer, of the 
Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago, who has long 
