We regret to record the death of Mrs. Charles Brinton Coxe, friend and patron of the Museum, who died at her home in Drifton in October. It will be recalled that Mrs. Coxe’s sympathetic cooperation with her son, the late Mr. Eckley B. Coxe, Jr., President of the Board of Managers, in his benefactions to the Museum, was continued up to the time of his death in 1916. By the will of Mrs. Coxe, the Museum benefits to the extent of $50,000, this amount to be used towards the erection of rooms for the Egyptian Section.
Mr. Pierre S. duPont has resigned from the Board of Managers of the Museum.
Mr. W. Hinckle Smith has been elected a Manager of the Museum to fill the vacancy caused by the resignation of the late Major B. Franklin Pepper which took place in April, 1917.
Mr. F. Corlies Morgan, Treasurer of the University of Penn-sylvania, has been elected Treasurer of the Museum.
Mr. H. U. Hall, Assistant Curator of the Section of General Ethnology, returned to the Museum in September immediately after his demobilization.
Dr. Stephen B. Luce, Assistant Curator of the Mediterranean Section, who was demobilized in the spring, returned to his duties at the Museum on October 1st.
Dr. Stephen Langdon, formerly Curator of the Babylonian Section of the University Museum, has been appointed Professor of Assyrialogy at Oxford University to succeed Professor A. H. Sayce who has retired.
Mr. W. B. Van Valin returned from his two years at Point Barrow, Alaska, in November. The collections obtained by Mr. Van Valin in the excavation of ancient village and burial sites near Point Barrow have also arrived at the Museum.
Dr. Edward Chiera contributes the following note.
In Volume I, No. 2, of the Babylonian Publications of the Museum, by Dr. Lutz, just published, are two tablets which will prove to be of special interest. These two tablets, which are numbered 96 and 103, have not as yet been translated. They appear to contain similar matter and to refer to a dialogue between a god and a man. The inscription on tablet 103, on which the first four or five lines are destroyed, begins with a statement on the part of the man to the effect that his condition is one of fear and grief, the reason for which must have been contained in the lost lines. The man appears. afraid of hearing himself called. In reply God, after reproaching him and telling him that he will not be able to lift himself up from his. low state, drives him away from his presence and prohibits him from continuing to attend to his fields and his oxen. The tablet ends with a promise of a new humanity to which great abundance will be given.
Gifts.
Mr. Harold S. Colton spent the summer in southwest Arizona, where he made excavations in a number of minor ruins.The results of these excavations have been presented by-Mr. Colton to the University Museum.
Mrs. Harry W. Harrison, a piece of tapa cloth from Fiji.
Mrs. Emma W. Evans, a Philippine saddle.
Dr. John Clarence Lee, an Apache Indian basket.
Mrs. Edgar Fahs Smith, two Indian baskets.
Mr. Eldridge R. Johnson, a Saltillo Indian blanket.
Mr. S. H. Cregar, Jr., four North American Indian specimens.
Mr. Joseph L. Wilson, four Tonga and Fiji clubs, one Tonga, carved bailer, one African ivory trumpet.
Mrs. Charles Roberts, five Indian baskets.
Miss Anne Thomson, a collection of native pottery and metalwork from Tangier, together with a group of European arms and armor.
Benjamin H. Ray, a collection of Chinese and Philippine photographs and four volumes on China.
Purchases.
Sixteen Chinese porcelains of the K’ang Hsi Period.
Carved elephant tusk from the Lonago Coast of Africa.
Selected pieces of Arabic woodwork, tiles, pottery and mosaic.
During the summer the Tibetan Collection, for some time in storage, was reinstalled in Pepper Hall.
The Persian pottery, bronzes, woodwork, tiles, rugs and textiles were also reinstalled during the summer. Ancient China, India, Persia and Tibet are now represented consecutively by exhibitions on the main floor.
An American Indian collection has been loaned for a period of three years to the Reading Museum. Another collection has been loaned to the Boy Scouts of Philadelphia.
A collection of models has been deposited with the Children’s Department of the Pennsylvania Museum.
The Wednesday afternoon course of lectures given for the schools from October 1st to December 15th proved increasingly successful. On each occasion the Auditorium was filled with teachers and their pupils and on several occasions the lectures had to be repeated from one to three times in order that all of the schools desiring the benefit of the lectures might be accommodated. The course will be resumed in March.
Visitors to the Museum will learn with regret of the death of Mr. Andrew Watts which took place on November 30th at the age of fifty-two. Mr. Watts had been continuously in the employ of the Museum since 1899. He will be remembered by the public for the admirable way in which he discharged his many duties and contributed to their comfort and enjoyment. Among the visible and permanent results of his work the condition of the building and grounds bear witness to his ability and devotion.