have given £4,000, thereby showing its great value ; to this he 

 afterwards added those rich collections which he had amassed in 

 every department of Natural History, besides artificial curiosities, 

 all which, being bequeathed by him to the public, along Avith his 

 extensive library of Ijooks and manuscripts, formed the basis of 

 our great national establishment, — the British Museum. 



But it is not my intention to enumerate the various Museums 

 got together for private use, or for the advantage of the public, 

 since the time we have been speaking of to the present day. 

 The principal among those existing during the latter part of the 

 last century, or the early part of this, were that of the Duchess 

 of Portland, an " eminent patroness of Natural History," 

 among whose treasures of art was the celebrated Barberiui vase, 

 now in the British Museum, and more generally known by the 

 name of the Portland Vase, — Sir Ashton Lever's Museum in 

 London, which some still living may remember as one of the 

 largest assemblages of natural objects ever before exhibited in 

 this country, — William Hunter's "formed between 1770 and 

 1800, and now at Glasgow, the not less celebrated Museum of 

 his brother, John Hunter, now at the College of Surgeons, 

 Lincoln's Inn Fields," — a Museum of British Zoology, collected 

 by Donovan, author of several illustrated works on our native 

 animals, — another by Sowerby, consisting of shells, minerals, 

 iind other objects, — Brookes's Museum of the skeletons of 

 animals, birds, &c., in addition to stuffed specimens, — and lastly, 

 Bullock's, comprising a large collection of natural and foreign 

 curiosities, and especially rich in the birds and animals of South 

 America. Of late years, as we are aware, Museums have become 

 so general that there is scarce a provincial town in this country 

 or abroad, entirely without one, whilst almost every working 

 naturalist has his own private collection in illustration of that 

 particular department of Natiu-al History which he chiefly studies. 



It is time then to pass from this part of our subject to the 

 principles which should guide us in the formation and arrange- 



