THE MUSEUMS <>F THE FUTURfc. 441 



note worth 3 are those devoted to zoology, and chief among them that 

 in our own American Cambridge. The Museum of Comparative Xool- 

 ogy, founded l>y the Agassiz's, "to illustrate the history of creation, 

 as far as the present state of knowledge reveals that history," was in 

 1887, pronounced by the English naturalist, Alfred Russell Wallace, 

 "to be far in advance of similar institutions in Europe as an educational 

 institution, whether as regards the general public, the private student, 

 or the specialist." 



Next to Cambridge, after the zoological section of the museums of 

 London and Paris, stands the collections in the Imperial Cabinet in 

 Vienna, and those of the zoological museums in Berlin, Ley den, Copen- 

 hagen, and Christiania. 



Among botanical museums, that in the Royal Gardens at Kew, near 

 Loudon, is pre-eminent, with its colossal herbarium containing the 

 finest collection in the world, aud its special museum of economic botany 

 founded in 1847, both standing m the midst of a collection of living 

 plants. There is also in Berlin the Koyal liotanical Museum, founded 

 in 1818 as the Royal Herbarium ; in St. Petersburg, the Herbaria of 

 the Imperial Botanical Garden. 



Among the geological and mineralogical collections the mineral 

 cabinet in Vienna, arranged in the imperial castle, is among the first. 



The Museum of Practical Geology in London, which is attached to 

 the Geological Survey of the United Kingdom, was founded in 1837, to 

 exhibit the collections of the survey, in order to " show the applications 

 of geology to the useful purposes of life." Like every other healthy 

 museum, it soon had investigations in progress in connection with its 

 educational work, and many very important discoveries have been made 

 in its laboratories. It stands in the very first rank of museums for pop- 

 ular instruction, the arrangement of the exhibition halls being most 

 admirable. Of museums of anatomy there are thirty of considerable 

 magnitude, all of which have grown up in connection with schools of 

 medicine aud surgery, except' the magnificent Army Medical Museum 

 in Washington. 



The Medical Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons in London is 

 probably first in importance. The collections of St. Thomas's, Guy's, 

 St. George's, and other hospitals are very rich in anatomical and path- 

 ological specimens. The oldest public anatomical museum in London is 

 that of St. Bartholomew's. 



Paris, Edinburgh, and Dublin have large anatomical and materia- 

 medica collections. Asa rule, the medical museums of Europe are con 

 nected with universities. Dr. Billings, Curator of the Army Medical 

 museum in Washington, has traced accurately the growth of medical 

 collections both at home and abroad, and from his address upon med- 

 ical museums, aspresident of the Congress of American Physicians and 

 Surgeons, delivered in 1888, the facts here stated relating to this class 

 of museums have been gathered. The Army Medical Museum appar- 



