1 8 Cinciiniati Society of Natural History. 



The directors of the West Museum have already accepted in 

 in trust a large and valuable collection of ancient Peruvian 

 pottery. 



The extensive collection of minerals, fossils and archeology 

 belonging to Paul Mohr, Esq., will be displayed in the same 

 building. 



Mr. Cleneay's numismatic cabinet, together with his unriv- 

 aled collection in archeology, will no doubt take the same direc- 

 tion. By this action of the trustees in furnishing room in their' 

 fire-proof building for these valuable collections in science, they 

 have already laid the foundations of a great museum of the arts 

 and sciences, which will either overshadow or absorb all kindred 

 institutions in our city. If the Mechanics' Institute, the State 

 Archeological Association, the Historical Society of Ohio, the Nat- 

 ural History Society of this city, and all similar institutions, while 

 maintaining their separate organizations, were to concentrate in 

 one building, or cluster of buildings, with a common hall fur 

 assembly purposes, they would each and all better conserve the 

 purposes for which they were founded. 



Great libraries and museums permeate with their healthful in- 

 fluence all grades of society. They not only attract the passing 

 stranger but they invite permanent residents among the better class 

 of educated and refined people, and particularly special students 

 of science, who naturally seek homes in places where the largest 

 facilities are afforded for study. 



In a great commercial and manufacturing city comi)eting 

 sharply with rival cities for the trade of a wide extent of territory, 

 it becomes necessary that our citizens be thoroughly posted in re- 

 gard to the great and live questions of the day, and what can con- 

 duce to this end better than these great i)ublic institutions. 



Nearly all valuable discoveries and inventions were first 

 thought out and formulated in the busy brain of some scientist and 

 then handed over to a practical man who never could have origi- 

 nated them, but who is quick to discern their practical bearing 

 and to push them in the marts of the world for all they are worth. 

 It is only when the enthusiast in science and the practical man of 

 the world go hand in hand that there is real substantial progress. 



Our University can never become a seat of learning in the 

 true sense without these necessary adjuncts of the higher educa- 

 tion. Time was when our lovers of art were compelled to live in 

 exile in order to draw inspiration from the great art collections of 



