68 Mejnon'ai of George Brown Goode. 



teenth centuries, there grew up little museums of curiosities from foreign 

 lands, while iu the great fairs were always exhibited sundry gatherings 

 of strange and entertaining objects. 



At the middle of the last century there appear to have been several 

 such collections of curiosities in Britain. 



In Artedi's ichthyological works there are numerous references to 

 places where he had seen American fishes, especially at Spring Garden 

 (later known as the Vauxhall Garden, a famous place of resort), and at 

 the Nag's Head, and the White Bear, and the Green Dragon in 

 Stepney, in those days a famous hostelry in I^ondon. He speaks also of 

 collections at the houses of Mr. L,illia and in that of Master Saltero (the 

 barber-virtuoso, described by Bulwer in his Devereux), in Chelsea 

 and at Stratford, and also in the collection of Seba, in Amsterdam, and 

 in that of Hans Sloane. 



With the exception of ''the monk or Angcl-fish, Anglis, alias ]\Icrmaid- 

 fish" probably a species of Sqtmtma, which he saw at the Nag's Head, 

 all the fishes in these I^ondon collections belonged to the order Plectog- 

 nathi. 



Josselyn, in his Two Voyages to New England (1638-1673), after 

 telling us how a Piscataway colonist had the fortune to kill a Pilhannaw — 

 the king of the birds of prey — continues, ' ' How he disposed of her I 

 know not, but had he taken her alive and sent her over into England, 

 neither Bartholomew or Sturbridge Fair could have produced such 

 another sight. ' ' 



Shakespeare's mirror strongly reflects the spirit of the day. When 

 Trinculo, cast ashore upon a lonesome island, catches a glimpse of Caliban, 

 he exclaims : 



What have we here? A man or a fish? Dead or alive? A fish: he smells like a 

 fish; a very ancient and fish -like smell. . . . a strange fish! Were I in England 

 now, (as once I was), and had but this fish painted, not a holiday fool there but would 

 give a piece of silver; there would this monster make a man; any strange beast there 

 makes a man: when they will not give a doit to relieve a lame beggar, they will lay 

 out ten to see a dead Indian. 



The idea of a great national museum of science and art was first worked 

 out by lyord Bacon in his New Atlantis, a philosophical romance pub- 

 lished at the close of the seventeenth century. The first scientific 

 museum actually founded was that begun at Oxford in 1667, by Elias 

 Ashmole, still known as the Ashmolean Museum, composed chiefly of 

 natural history specimens collected by the botanists Tradescant, father 

 and son, in Virginia, and in the north of Africa. Soon after, in 1753, 

 the British Museum was established by act of Parliament, inspired by 

 the will of Sir Hans Sloane, who, dying in 1749, left to the nation his 

 invaluable collection of books, manuscripts, and curiosities." 



'The collections of Sloane, who was one of the early scientific explorers of 

 America, were like those of the Tradescants, contained many New World speci- 



