132 NATURAL SCIENCE [August 
ing his mind in other directions as well. At the same time it may be 
readily conceded that the possession of type specimens by small 
provincial museums in out-of-the-way places, is not for the advantage 
of science. 
But perhaps of greater importance, from a general point of view, 
is the disposal of the exhibited collections for educational purposes. 
The now well-known idea that the exhibited portion of a museum 
should be a collection of labels, illustrated by specimens, may be 
carried a great deal too far—so far as to upset the fundamental idea 
of a museum without attaining the object desired. Those who wish 
to study any particular branch of Natural History ought to find, in a 
well-arranged typical collection, where the specimens are provided 
with suitable descriptive labels, much invaluable assistance—but 
such labels can never supply the place of proper text-books, studied 
at home as well as in the museum or laboratory. We may take an 
example in this connection from Mr H. Bolton’s set of descriptive 
labels for the geological collection in the Peel Park Museum, Salford, 
which are published in full in this volume. These labels are in 
themselves very good and praiseworthy summaries of the present 
knowledge of the geological formations in Great Britain, but to the 
serious student who possesses a good text-book of geology they are 
wholly unnecessary, while to those who, like most of the general 
public, are previously entirely ignorant of the subject, they must 
be utterly unintelligible. The use of a label is, I presume, to tell 
what a specimen is and what it shows, and not to enter into a 
dissertation on any general subject, that being the business of the 
text-book and of the teacher. 
Mr Ord’s plan for teaching chemistry by specimens, diagrams, 
models, and descriptive labels, is to my mind carrying the educational 
theory of museums to a pitch of absurdity. A collection of metals, 
salts, &c., is no doubt a desirable feature in connection with the 
chemical department of a school or college, but you will learn 
chemistry only in the laboratory, and certainly not in a museum. 
But, however some of us may disagree with some of the notions 
of individual writers of papers in the present volume, the Museums 
Association is bound to do good by promoting the free discussion 
of the questions at issue. R. H. TRAQUAIR. 
THE GEOLOGICAL DEPARTMENT OF THE BRITISH MUSEUM 
A GUIDE TO THE Fossin INVERTEBRATES AND PLANTS in the Department of Geology 
and Palaeontology in the British Museum (Natural History), Cromwell Road, 
London, S.W. 8vo. Pp. xvi. 158, with 182 text-figures. Printed by order of the 
Trustees, 1897. Price, 1s. ; also in two parts, price 6d. each. 
THs is a remarkable shillingsworth, so much so that anything less 
than effusive thanks for it smacks of ingratitude. Thanks, we are 
sure, the public will offer to the trustees, to Dr Henry Woodward, 
the popular keeper of the department, and to the able set of colla- 
borators whose help he acknowledges. Only had the book been 
priced at five shillings or so could we have ventured on any criticism. 
We might then have asked for a little more co-ordination between the 
parts, a keener sense of proportion, and more careful selection of 
illustrations. With thirty-six pages devoted to the cephalopods, the 
