1897] THE PROVINCIAL MUSEUM 391 



Museums would be brought into direct communication with each 

 other, and the transference of specimens to centres where they would 

 be of most use would be immensely facilitated, while the small 

 museums would naturally become agents of supply of material 

 obtainable in their districts. The whereabouts of material for the 

 specialist would be better known, and be more readily available. 



The linking up and increased usefulness of provincial museums 

 would provide a healthy stimulus to local scientific societies, would 

 result in increased and more thorough field work, and do much to 

 aid that federation of remote scientific workers which is so desirable. 

 Moreover, it must not be forgotten that such a chain of museums 

 offers the best means whereby the collections of the humblest and 

 most distant worker might be conveyed to the one best fitted to 

 deal with them. 



The plan we advocate is crude, but designedly so, for elaboration 

 provokes criticism of detail rather than of principles, and it is the 

 latter which are all-important to determine in connection with the 

 present phase of the provincial museum question. 



Herbert Bolton. 



