1898] SOME NEW BOOKS 57 
the President suggests that a committee should be appointed to report 
upon two questions: (1) “ What is the best form and arrangement of 
rooms in a building intended to serve as a museum? (2) What is 
the best way of exhibiting specimens, according to their various kinds, 
inamuseum?” The rest of the address is taken up with an account 
of the state of museums at Oxford, and of Prof. Lankester’s own 
attempt to follow the principles of Flower and Brown Goode in the 
face of considerable difficulties. 
Entomologists will welcome Prof. Poulton’s account of the 
methods of setting and labelling Lepidoptera for museums. Prof. 
Miers’ description of the arrangement of the mineral collection in the 
University Museum will also be of much service to those in charge of 
similar collections, although the philosophical scheme adopted by him 
is, as Mr Rudler said, hardly suitable for collections intended for the 
use of miners and such practical folk. A paper of somewhat novel 
character is that by Mr Harlan J. Smith, of the American Museum of 
Natural History, on Popular Museum Exhibits. Everyone knows 
that there are a number of people of various ages who use museums 
as promenades, doss-houses, or playgrounds. If the attention of some 
of these can be arrested by a sensational exhibit they may perhaps be 
led to look at something more, and thus the museum may be brought 
into contact with an entirely fresh class. 
The recognition of museums by the Council of Education has set 
fresh problems before the museum curator, and gives rise to an in- 
teresting discussion opened by Mrs Tubbs, former member of the 
Hastings School Board. Another discussion of much importance was 
that of Dr Flinders Petrie’s scheme of a federal staff for museums, 
that is to say, a band of peripatetic specialists who should visit 
museum after museum, naming specimens, lecturing, and supervising 
the exhibits in his own particular department. Mr Goodrich’s 
valuable notes on museum preparations have already found publica- 
tion 1n our pages. 
The report of the meeting is followed by various “ General Notes” 
by the secretary, Mr E. Howarth. Among these are short abstracts 
based on “reports and handbooks received from various museums 
belonging to the Association.” We should have thought that it would 
have been of more value to members of the Association to have given 
them an account of museums that had not yet entered the select 
circle; but Mr Howarth, we are glad to see, considers that full 
information upon these matters can always be obtained from Natur al 
Science, “an indispensable monthly journal in all museums,” so that 
we are not inclined to insist upon our criticism. We are glad, too, 
to notice that the Association has now opened its membership to 
museums outside the limits of the United Kingdom, and that advan- 
tage of this has been taken by the museums of Baroda, Colombo, 
Jamaica, Western Australia, Salt Lake City, and the ‘Australian 
Museum. We are, however, somewhat surprised to see how com- 
paratively few museums of the United Kingdom have availed them- 
selves of the advantages offered by this Association. Does this point 
to indifference on the “part of their curators, or to some fault of which 
we are not aware in the working of the Association? Or is it merely 
due to want of advertisement ? 
