I30 NATURAL SCIENCE. August, 



this proposal ; but provided that certain provincial museums contain 

 special collections which compare favourably with the best of the 

 same kind elsewhere, the advantages of separating the type-speci- 

 mens from the rest of the collection are not all on one side. 



Mr. G. H. Carpenter's paper on "Collections to Illustrate the 

 Evolution and Geographical Distribution of Animals " deserves more 

 special notice. The attempt to increase the educational function of 

 museums is certainly a laudable one ; but the method employed has 

 its dangers as well as its advantages. Mr. Carpenter has selected 

 such subjects as " Natural Selection," "Variation," " Life-history of 

 Individuals," and so on ; and has illustrated them by means of a 

 small number of specimens taken from different groups of animals, 

 and explained by means of printed labels. Some exception may be 

 taken to the length of these labels. It may be questioned whether 

 the amount of information which takes up nearly two pages of small 

 print in the Report would not be better given in a small guide-book. 

 If a museum is to keep up to date, it is necessary to alter labels from 

 time to time ; and it is obvious that the longer the label the more 

 chance there will be that some statement or name will in course of 

 time be found erroneous, and will vitiate the entire label. The 

 mistake can be corrected with but little trouble in the issue of a new 

 edition of the guide-book. The printed matter is, moreover, the part 

 which is most likely to be neglected in an exhibit which consists of a 

 few specimens explained by a disproportionate amount of label. 



The illustrations are not always worthy of their place. The 

 statement that certain animals are flesh-eaters, needs hardly to be 

 illustrated by so obvious an instance as a Spider, nor does it appear 

 necessary to call special attention to the fact that a Tiger's teeth are 

 structures for offence. Although I would not appear to disparage the 

 system as a whole, or the way in which it has been carried out in the 

 present instance, it seems to me that the illustration of truisms is only 

 one of the dangers which are to be avoided. The series are in some 

 cases constructed to illustrate a theory, and the explanations given of 

 facts may not really be justified by the actual state of our knowledge. 

 " If you fill cases with processes, showing how brushes are made, 

 within six months perhaps some new feature will be invented, and 

 you will be asked, * What is the use of showing these things which are 

 not up to date ? ' " This remark was made by the President in the 

 course of the discussion on another paper, and will serve to point the 

 moral of the above remarks. An indiscriminate use of the system in 

 museums which are not presided over by a scientific curator might 

 easily lead to deplorable results. S. F. Harmer. 



The Light Study of Conchology. 



Molluscs. By the Rev. A. H. Cooke. Brachiopods (Recent). By A. E. Shipley. 

 Brachiopods (Fossil). By F. R. C. Reed. Being vol. iii. of the "Cambridge 

 Natural History," edited by S. F. Harmer and A. E. Shipley. Pp. xiv., 535, 

 with text-illustrations and four folding maps. London : Macmillan, 1895. 

 Price 17s. net. 



" Why, you might take to some light study ; conchology, now." So 

 said Mr. Brooke in " Middlemarch " ; and these are the words that 

 Mr. Cooke takes as his motto, not inappropriately. For it is clear 

 that Mr. Cooke entered on his study with a light heart, and lightness 

 is the characteristic of his work in more senses than Mr. Brooke or 

 Mr. Cooke intended. 



