REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1922. 15 



can be seen here supplementing their class-room occupations or 

 studies. Under authority from Congress the small colleges and 

 higher grades of schools and academies throughout the land, espe- 

 cially in places where museums do not exist, are also being aided in 

 their educational work by sets of duplicate specimens, selected and 

 labeled to meet the needs of both teachers and pupils. 



Nor has the elementary or even the higher education been by any 

 means the sole gainer from the work of the Museum. To advance 

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

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

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

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

 labeling of collections in order that they may be accessible 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 through its 

 numerous publications. But the collections have not been held for 

 the study of the staff nor for the scientific advancement of those 

 belonging to the establishment. Most freely have tJiey been put at 

 the disposal of investigators connected with other institutions, with- 

 out whose help the record of scientific progress based upon the ma- 

 terial in the Museum would have been greatly curtailed. When it is 

 possible to so arrange, the investigator comes to Washington ; other- 

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

 in this country or abroad. In this manner practically every prom- 

 inent specialist throughout the world interested in the subjects here 

 well represented has had some use of the collections and thereby the 

 National Museum has come to be recognized as a conspicuous factor 

 in the advancement of knowledge wherever civilization has a foot- 

 hold. 



