ZOOLOGICAL MUSEUMS. 489 



29tli Dec. 18G3, pour rinspection dii materiel du Museum d' 

 Histoire Naturelle. Paris, 1865. 



(4.) Ais'NUAL Eeport of the Trustees of the Museum of Com- 

 PAEATiTE Zoology at Haryard College, in Cambridge, to- 

 gether with the Eeport of the Director, 1864. Boston, U. S. A. 

 1865. 



(5.) Anis'ual Eeport of the Board of Ee gents of the Smith- 

 sonian Institution, showing the Operations, Expenditures, and 

 Condition of the Institution for the Tear 1863. Washington, 

 1864. 



(6.) Museum d' Histoire Naturelle des Pats-Bas. Eeyue Mfe- 

 thodique et Critique des Collections eeposees dans cet 

 etablissement. Leyde, 1862-4. Parts 1—6. 



As regards the progress of Zoological Science nothing can be of 

 greater importance than the welfare of the great public Museums 

 which every civilized nation in some form or other maintains within 

 its dominions. It is to these institutions, and to those that are 

 employed in them, that we mu^ chiefly look for aid in extending 

 our present iaiperfect acquaintance with the numerous and varied 

 forms of the Animal Kingdom. Glreat as the benefits are which 

 have been conferred on Zoology by amateurs and private collections, 

 there can be no doubt that it is of far greater importance to the 

 advance of science to keep our great public Museums and their 

 staffs in an efficient state, than to give any amount of encourage- 

 ment to the exertions of individual Naturalists. There can be no 

 question therefore of the interest which attaches itself to the publi- 

 cations, of which the titles are given above. They supply us with 

 information as to the present state of some of the most important 

 public collections of Europe and America, and as such are eminently 

 worthy of our readers' attention. 



We begin then by taking up the document annually presented 

 to Parliament by the Trustees of the " British Museum," which, 

 besides the accounts of the income and expenditure of that esta- 

 blishment for the past year, with which we will not now trouble 

 ourselves, contains reports from the officers of the different depart- 

 ments as to the "progress made in the cataloguing and arrangement, 

 and an account of objects added, in the year 1864." Before noticing 

 them severally, we may remark that a person unacquainted with the 

 peculiar regime prevailing in the British Museum, would be rather 



N.H.R.— 186.5. 2 L 



