220 THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL 



abroad are chiefly for research and the special instruction of students, but the 

 Senckenberg Museum has for its chief object the instruction of the public 

 in natural history, first by popular lectures given in properly arranged 

 courses by members of the staff, second by carefully selected, well arranged 

 and well labeled specimens in the exhibition halls. 



The Senckenberg Society is an old one, but their museum, in its 

 present quarters, dates only from 1907. This new building embodies new- 

 ideas in the arrangement of exhibition halls, in lighting, in the construction 

 of cases and in the equipment of its lecture halls and laboratories. In the 

 exhibits unnecessary duplication is avoided and a strong effort is made to 

 illustrate all of the more important and interesting groups of animal life 

 by at least one choice example. For instance in the great central court is 

 an original skeleton of the herbivorous dinosaur Diplodocus obtained from 

 the American Museum through the late President Jesup, a skull of the 

 horned dinosaur Triceratops purchased from an American collector and the 

 skeleton of the Whitfield mastodon obtained from this Museum. The 

 Senckenberg Museum is also ambitious in the matter of habitat groups 

 and already two very large and elaborate ones have been installed. One 

 represents two phases of African mammalian life, the two groups of animals 

 each dominated by an adult giraffe, being arranged on opposite sides of the 

 case yet the whole being so blended as to present a single picture. The 

 second group is of the Arctic regions and the animals include the walrus, 

 polar bear Arctic fox and hare. 



Frankfurt is famous for the civic pride displayed by its inhabitants and 

 the museum is fortunate in having many wealthy friends who contribute 

 generously toward its development. Perhaps the most interesting and 

 unusual feature of this museum however, is the hearty and earnest coopera- 

 tion of the public in the actual work of the museum. Many young men 

 and women of the city, some of them students in science and all interested 

 in natural history, come to the museum during free hours and may be seen 

 scattered through the laboratories engaged in the preparation of specimens, 

 in labeling, cataloging and arranging collections, in the preparation of 

 charts as illustrations for the lectures, and in various kinds of work connected 

 with a museum, under the supervision of the regular staff of course, and all 

 without pay. In this manner the workers acquire much knowledge which 

 could be gained in no other way and the museum obtains services for which 

 it would otherwise be obliged to hire assistants. Both the directors of the 

 museum and the public take particular pride in this cooperation. 



It was gratifying to learn that the methods of exhibition and instruction 

 in general in our Museum, through the agency of the Journal and the 

 Guide Leaflcis, are closely studied by the directors of the Frankfurt 

 Museum, and it may be said in return that their splendid institution has 

 many suggestions to offer to the American Museum and others. 



