REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, VJ20. 13 



■wliere museums do not exist, are also being aided in their educational ] 



Avork by sets of duplicate specimens, selected and labeled to meet the ' 



needs of both teachers and pupils. i 



Xor has the elementary or even the higher education been by any .| 



means the sole gainer from the Avork of the Museum. To advance i 



knowledge, to gradually extend the boundaries of learning, has been i 



one of the great tasks to which the Museum, in consonance with the j 



spirit of the Institution, has set itself from the first. Its staff, though | 



chiefly engaged in the duties incident to the care, classification, and i 



labeling of collections in order that they may be accessil)le to the | 



public and to students, has yet in these operations made important | 

 discoveries in every department of the Museum's activities, which 

 have in turn been communicated to other scholars tlirough its nu- 

 merous publications. But the collections have not been held for the 



study of the staff nor for the scientific advancement of those belong- ! 



in"- to the establishment. JSIost freely have thev been put at the dis- \ 



posal of investigators connected with other institutions, without ' 



whose help the record of scientific progress based upon the material j 

 ^n the Museum would have been greatly curtailed. When it is pos- 

 sible to so arrange, the investigator conies to Washington ; otherwise 

 such collections as he needs are sent to him, whether he resides in this 

 country or abroad. In this manner practically every prominent 



specialist throughout the world interested in the subjects here well ' 



represented has had some use of the collections and thereby the Na- \ 



tional Museum has come to be recognized as a conspicuous factor in | 



the advancement of knowledge wherever civilization has a foothold. ; 



