EUROPEAN HERBARIA. 15 
over the former, perhaps eighty feet long and thirty wide above 
the galleries, and very conveniently lighted from the roof. 
Beneath the galleries are four or five small rooms on each 
side, lighted from the exterior, used as cabinets for study and 
for separate herbaria, and above them the same number of 
smaller rooms or closets, occupied by duplicate or unarranged 
collections. The cases which contain the herbaria occupy the 
walls of the large hall and of the side rooms. Their plan may 
serve as a specimen of that generally adopted in France. The 
shelves are divided into compartments in the usual manner: 
but instead of doors the cabinet is closed by a curtain of thick 
and. coarse brown linen, kept extended by a heavy bar at- 
tached to the bottom, which is counterpoised by concealed 
weights, and the curtain is raised or dropped by a pulley. 
Paper of very ordinary quality is generally used, and the 
specimens are attached, either to half sheets or to double 
sheets, by slips of gummed paper, or by pins, or sometimes 
the specimen itself is glued to the paper. Genera or other 
divisions are separated by interposed sheets, having the name 
written on a projecting slip. 
According to the excellent plan adopted in the arrangement 
of these collections, which is due to Desfontaines, three kinds 
of herbaria have been instituted, namely: 1. The general her- 
barium. 2. The herbaria of particular works or celebrated 
authors, which are kept distinct, the duplicates alone being 
distributed in the general collection. 38. Separate herbaria of 
different countries, which are composed of the duplicates taken 
from the general herbarium. To these, new accessions from 
different countries are added, which from time to time are 
assorted and examined, and those required for the general her- 
barium are removed to that collection. The ancient herbarium 
of Vaillant forms the basis of the general collection; the speci- 
mens, which are all labelled by his own hand, are in excellent 
preservation, and among them plants derived from Cornuti or 
Dr. Sarrasin may occasionally be met with. This collection, 
augmented to many times its original extent, by the plants of 
Commerson, Dombey, Poiteau, Leschenault, etc., and by the 
duplicates from the special herbaria, probably contains at this 
