Recent Acquisitions at the Natural History Museum

Abstract

IMPORTANT collections, mostly of large ungulate mammals, have been received as donations from Major P. H. G. and Mrs. Powell-Cotton and their daughters, collected by them in Tunisia, Italian Somaliland and Zululand. A collection of forty-six mammals from Uganda has been received as a gift from Captain C. R. S. Pitman, and the skin of a lion from British Somaliland has been presented by Mr. F. J. E. Manners Smith. Seventy-four photographs of mammals have been presented by exhibitors at the recent ‘Country Life Exhibition of Nature Photography which was held in the Museum. Mr. F. N. Ashcroft has enriched the mineral collection by a further selection from his collection of Swiss minerals. The gift comprises 651 specimens from ninety-seven localities, and the minerals represented include datolite, rutile, sphene, apatite, smoky-quartz, rock-crystal and adularia. The Director of the Geological Survey of Uganda has presented a series of the ores and associated rocks from the Kilembe mine, Toro, Uganda. The Department has received by exchange two pieces and fragments, with the combined weight of 1,372 gm. (about 3 lb.), of the meteoric stone which was seen to fall in 1929 at Taug, 25 miles south of Kirkuk, Irak. The collection of precious stones has been strengthened by the purchase of cut specimens of rubellite, euclase, fluorite, amazonite, and rhodonite, with in some instances the corresponding rough material. A small suite of newly discovered minerals from Montana also has been purchased.