128 REPORT ON NATIONAL MUSEUM. 



extensive illustrated work upon prehistoric fishing in Europe and Kortb 

 America. 



DEPARTMENT OF ARTS AND INDUSTRIES. 



When, in 1857, the Smithsonian Institution assumed the custody of 

 the collection of the United States Exploring Expedition, together with 

 the miscellaneous material which had gathered around this nucleus, a 

 great quantity of material was transferred to the Smithsonian building 

 which has not to this day been classified and placed upon exhibition. 

 The rapid growth, especially during the past decade, of the collections 

 illustrating the ethnology of North American Indians, and especially 

 of prehistoric objects from this continent, has absorbed the attention of 

 all who were interested in this department of the Museum. A year ago 

 the majority of the foreign ethnological objects were, on account of lack 

 of room, packed up or crowded together in a too limited amount of case- 

 room. At the close of the Centennial Exhibition the Museum received 

 from foreign Governments great quantities of material exhibited at 

 Philadelphia, which, while possessing an undoubted ethnological inter- 

 est, could not in many instances be displayed in the manner usually 

 adopted in ethnological museums. 



The material received from Philadelphia in 1876 was for several years 

 stored in the Armory building. On completion of the present Museum 

 building, and before the collections could be transferred to it, it became 

 necessary to decide by what method the stored material (other than 

 zoological, botanical, geological, or miueralogical) could be most effect- 

 ively classified for purposes of study and exhibition. 



After a careful consideration of the methods of the large museums of 

 Europe, the officers of the iMuseum agreed that the ordinary classifi- 

 cation by races or tribes would in this case be less satisfactory than a. 

 classification based upon function. 



In the report of the Smithsonian Institution for 1881, pages 117-122,. 

 and also in circular No. 13, of the National Museum, the Assistant Direc-^ 

 tor presented a provisional outline of a plan of classification for the Mu- 

 seum. This classification, while its purpose was to embrace ever^' kind 

 of object which could possibly be exhibited in the Museum , was especially^ 

 full in those parts which related to the arts and industries, forty-nine 

 out of the sixty-four primary classes relating to this group of museum 

 material. The general idea of the classification, as there explained, is 

 that the collections should constitute a museum of anthropology, the 

 word "anthropology" being applied in its most comprehensive sense. 

 It should exhibit the physical characteristics, the history, the manners 

 past and present of all races civilized and savage, and should also illus- 

 trate hum^ culture and industry in all their phases; the earth, its 

 physical structure, and its products are to be exhibited with special 

 reference to their adaptation for use by man. The so-called " natural 

 history" collections are grouped in separate series, which are to be 



