2i6 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



and the gallery of plaster casts for art-students. Frequently, too, the 

 museum of a local society is intended solely to preserve natural or 

 artificial objects for reference by the collectors and amateurs who con- 

 stitute its members. 



Scarcely any museum can nowadays be regarded as the strict pre- 

 serve of investigators. In fact, the total number of museums whose 

 main function it is to amass vast collections for the advancement of 

 knowledge can never be very great; indeed, the smaller the better. 

 The scattering of material and of the necessary literary apparatus 

 through thousands of towns would not conduce to either economy or 

 efficiency. Concentration permits of comparison, better equipment, 

 a larger and more highly trained staff, while it necessitates the inter- 

 course of fellow-workers and leads to interchange of ideas. Such a 

 museum should be a great organization for research, with laboratories, 

 libraries, studios and publications, with a staff of investigators, prepa- 

 rators, artists, photographers, copyists and the usual servants. I have 

 not mentioned curators, believing any attempt to separate them from 

 investigators to be a false economy. 



Museums entirely devoted to the inspiration of the lay public are 

 hard to find. But they exist in theory if not in practice; and theo- 

 rectically too the encouragement of art and science among the populace 

 is the main reason for the establishment of most museums, especially 

 the municipal. 



Now, where museums come to grief is in attempting to sit on these 

 three stools, or rather through not distinguishing clearly enough that 

 the stools are three and that they are of very different nature. 



A small museum with small means should make the choice of not 

 more than two out of the three; and the function to be dropped 

 should, in my opinion, be investigation. JSTot that the curators of 

 small museums should be warned off the field of original work; but 

 the museum should neither amass nor preserve specimens of interest 

 chiefly to specialists. From the two remaining functions, instruction 

 and inspiration, it should select the one more appropriate to the con- 

 ditions of its existence and spend its energies on that. 



Many a large museum, on the other hand, is able to undertake 

 all three functions, and if it be supported out of public funds, it is its 

 duty so to do. It is not enough to provide admirably for two classes 

 of visitors, and to suppose that the same provision will satisfy the third 

 class. On the contrary, the more thoroughly the wants of any two 

 classes are supplied, the more will the third class be left out in the cold. 



Take the case of a large museum of any subject. Usually an 

 attempt is made to combine all three functions in one series of rooms 

 and cases. For the sake of the collectors and amateurs, a large num- 

 ber of objects is exhibited; and this perplexes the public. For the 



