206 J. HOPKINSON — FOBMATION AND 



being all that is necessary for this purpose, or, in a large museum, 

 a double suite of rooms, as may be shown thus : — 



This arrangement is carried out in the table showing the Classes 

 and Orders of the Animal Kingdom (Table lY, pp. 211-214). 



I will now only add that with every specimen in our museum 

 there should be a label giving the generic and specific name, the 

 locality where and the date when found, and in the case of fossils, 

 the geological formation ; and I will conclude in the words of 

 Edward Forbes: — "I cannot help hoping that the time will come 

 when every British town even of moderate size will be able to boast 

 of possessing public institutions for the education and instruction 

 of its adults as well as its youthful and childish population, — when 

 it shall have a well-organised museum, wherein collections of 

 natural bodies shall be displayed, not with regard to show or 

 curiosity, biit according to their illustration of the analogies and 

 affinities of organised and unorganised objects, so that the visitor 

 may at a glance learn something of the laws of nature, — wherein 

 the products of the surrounding district, animate and inanimate, 

 shall be scientifically marshalled and their industrial applications 

 carefully and suggestively illustrated, — wherein the memorials of 

 the history of the neighbouring province and the races that have 

 peopled it shall be reverently assembled and learnedly yet popularly 

 explained ; when each town shall have a library the property of 

 the public and freely open to the well-conducted reader of every 

 class ; when its public walks and parks (too many as yet existing 

 only in prospect) shall be made instructors in botany and agricul- 

 ture ; when it shall have a gallery of its own, possibly not boasting 

 of the most famous pictures or statues, but nevertheless showing 

 good examples of sound art, examples of the history and purpose of 

 design, and, above all, the best specimens to be procured of works 

 of genius by its own natives who have deservedly risen to fame." * 

 These remarks were made in 1853, before the act was passed for 

 promoting the establishment of free public libraries and museums 

 in our provincial towns, under which act much progress in this 

 direction has been made; and many public parks then "existing 

 onlv in prospect" have now been opened. Still much remains to 

 be done towards realising the ideal picture of Edward Forbes, who 

 worked hard himself towards it in London and in Edinburgh. 

 Watford, with its Public Library and its School of Science and Art, 

 is pressing forward on the road which he laid out, and will have 

 advanced still farther on this road when the products of its county, 

 animate and inanimate, and the memorials of its history, are 

 scientifically displayed within the walls of its Museum. 



* ' On the Educational Uses of Museums,' p. 18. 



