CARD CATALOGUE SYSTEM. WAITE. 217 



The CARD-CATALOGUE SYSTEM adapted to 

 Museum Requirements. 



By Edgar R. Waite, F.L.S., Zoologist. 



In a thoroughly up-to-date Museucu there must always be going 

 on an active exchange of specimens with kindred institutions in 

 other countries. To catalogue the collections in such an establish- 

 ment may in itself be a matter of some difficulty. If one is content 

 merely to enter the names and particulars of current acquisitions 

 in a book form register, and rule out, or otherwise mark, entries 

 representing specimens sent away, nothing could be simpler. Such 

 a register, however, cannot be kept in systematic order : a great 

 disadvantage when dealing with Natural History specimens, and 

 hours may be spent in tracking the source of any particular object. 



In dealing with the large number of specimens under my care 

 at the Museum, namely. Mammals, Reptiles, Fishes, and all 

 Osteological preparations, I had the inadequacy of the usual form 

 of register for ordinary working purposes, forcibly brought home 

 to me; for my own convenience, therefore, I duplicated the record 

 of current donations, etc., according to the plan below referred to. 



Eighteen months ago the Curator instructed me to prepare a 

 catalogue of the duplicate Mammals available for exchange, and 

 for this purpose I was provided with an additional register. I 

 then explained what system I had instituted, and the Curator 

 heartily approving, permission was accorded me to officially adopt 

 it in the Institution, as referred to in his Annual Report for 1898.* 



The Curator's remarks were based on a six months' trial, during 

 which time a comparatively small catalogue only had been prepared. 

 All the collections in the various sections previously mentioned 

 are being catalogued on this plan, and so far the work has occupied 

 an assistant nearly the whole of the eighteen months indicated. 



Many important libraries are now catalogued by the " card " 

 system, and it is simply an adaptation of this to Museum require- 

 ments that I desire to bring into notice. Once a book is placed 

 in a library it usually remains there, and if worn out is merely 

 replaced, the substituted book bearing the reference number of the 

 discarded one; changes occur only by interpolating new volumes. 

 With a museum collection the case is different, for, in addition to 

 the new material, specimens are constantly being removed by 

 exchange, and old examples can never be actually replaced, for 

 unlike a book, each has an individuality of its own, depending on 

 locality, age, sex, season, or other condition. 



* Aust. Mus. Ann. Report, 1898 (1899), p. 6. 



