CHAPTER XV 



The Glory Hole 



X 



HE MAN In the street has always been inclined to 

 look down his nose at museum curators, and for as long 

 as I have been one of them I have been pondering the 

 reason, I think I have it. The average man doesn't like a 

 miser and, one way or another, the curator cannot help 

 appearing miserly. When I first took charge of the Agasslz 

 Museum, I found one big glass jar filled with chicken 

 heads, another with burned matches, another with old 

 rubbers. The chicken heads were potential material for 

 dissection, and the fact that a dollar's worth of heads filled 

 a twenty-dollar jar never occurred to the man who ate 

 those chickens, who was no other than Louis Agassiz 

 himself. 



The Museum at one time housed an unbelievable num- 

 ber of strange odds and ends accumulated through the 

 years and saved because the old-time museum man thought 

 it was a sin to throw anything out. I have been accused 

 of erring in this manner myself. It is true that if you look 

 at a thing long enough you lose perspective. Any object, 

 no matter how revolting and loathsome, seen sufficiently 

 often, blunts the senses, and one becomes disinclined to the 

 effort necessary to destroy it or get rid of it. 



Pride of possession is a curious attribute of mankind. This 

 was brought sharply to my mind recently when it occurred 



