122 



bulletin: museum of comparative zoology. 



other half going to P. T. Barnum's American Museum, New York, 

 where it Avas consumed by fire on the thirteenth of July, 1865. 



That little of value in the shape of natural history specimens accrued 

 to the Boston Museum up to the time of the Peale Museum purchase 

 scarcely admits of a doubt. The stuff received before that time was 

 contributed by museums that partook partly of a dime museum, 

 partly of a vaudeville show.^ Among the announcements made by 

 the proprietor of the Columbian Museum in the Boston Ccniinel news- 

 paper in 1797 I find the two following, which will serve to show the 

 character of those primitive places of amusement whose property 

 went to form the nucleus of the Boston Museum collection : — 



[Nov. 29, 1797.] 

 LATE ADDITIONS TO THE 



Columbian Museum, 



Head of the Mall, Boston. 



Mr. Bowen mforms the Public, That, he has purchased Mr. Raff's much 

 admired Exhibition of CONCERT CLOCKS, which are placed at the head 

 of the Museum Hall, as a valuable and pleasing addition to that very extensive 

 Repository of Curiosities. 



1. Canary Bird, which sings a variety of beautiful Songs, Minuets, 

 Marches, &c. as natural as life. 2. A company of Automaton Figures, which 

 dance to the music of a Harpsichord. 3. Three figures which play the Organ 

 and Clarinet, in Concert. 4. Three figures which play the Harpsichord and 

 Hautboys in concert. 5. King Herod beheading John the Baptist, and his 

 daughter holding a charger to receive the head. 6. A Chimney Sweep, and 

 his boy, on the top of a chimney. 7. Three figures which strike the hours 

 and quarters. 8. A butcher kiUing an Ox. 



The above CONCERT CLOCKS have been exhibited in New-York, with 

 universal applause, and are well worthy the attention of the Citizens of Boston, 

 and the pubUc in general. 



The Museum also contains the most extensive Collection of ELEGANT 

 PAINTINGS, that ever was exhibited in the United States, some of which are 

 10 by 12 feet, elegantly framed, and valued from 500 to 1000 Dollars each. 



Also, a collection of upwards of 

 50 elegant Figures of W A X-W O R K, large as life, among which are the 

 following (the most interesting) viz. 



1 The lack of appreciation of natural history by the American public diu-ing the 

 early part of the last centtiry appears in Scudder's avowal to Wilson that the ""Witch 

 of Endor" and "Potiphar's Wife" brought ten dollars to his museum where the 

 natural history brought one. Scudder was the founder of the old American Museum 

 of New York (Dunlap's History of the Rise and Progress of the Arts of Design in the 

 United States, 1834, 2, p. 199). 



