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INTRODUCTORY. 3 
Mr. Mayer devoted a large fortune to the acquisition, whenever he had the 
opportunity, of objects valuable to History, Archeology and Art. His 
museum was specially rich in Pottery, and in Assyrian, Egyptian, Greek 
and Medieval antiquities. His gift is remarkable not only as being the 
collection of one individual, but in containing, notwithstanding its great 
diversity, so little, owing to Mr. Mayer's wonderful discrimination and 
judgment, that is not of the highest value. Many, indeed, of the objects 
given by Mayer are unique, or beyond purchase except by a National 
museum, such as, to mention only one or two, the Fejervary Ivories, the 
Brian-Faussett collection of Anglo-Saxon antiquities, the Mexican Codex 
(M 12014), and the collection of Wedgwood Ware. 
The Derby bequest, opened to 
the public in March 1853, was 
at first exhibited in rooms, in a 
comparatively small house, in 
Duke Street, along with the nu- 
cleus of the Public Library, until 
the liberality of Sir William 
Brown provided for it a fitting 
home in 1860, by erecting, and 
presenting to the city, the stately 
edifice which now shelters it, and 
part of the Library. On the 
arrival of Mr. Mayer's collection 
in 1867, a large square central 
court, in the west wing, with three 
tiers of galleries surrounding it, 
was entirely set apart for the 
Mayer Museum. 
The acquisitions, by donation 
and purchase, to both the Derby 
and the Mayer Museums have, 
within the past few years, been 
so large, that there is now no 
: See ee longer room, not to exhibit them 
only, but even to store them. An extension has recently, therefore, been 
designed and is shortly to be erected, which will provide, on two floors, 
wide continuous and undivided galleries, surrounding a central court, to 
permit, what is possible in but few museums, the exhibition of the biological 
groups in their genetic relationships, as nearly as that can be done in a 
linear arrangement. 
Between the years 1876 and 1891, several slender opuscula, dealing with 
portions of the collections, were issued from the Museums, under the name 
of ‘Museum Reports.’ As, however, there is, at the end of every year, 
presented to the City Council, by the Committee, an ‘Annual Report,’ the 
similarity in name of the two publications, has given rise to considerable 
confusion. The Bulletin, therefore, will supersede the ‘Museum Reports’ 
and whereas the latter were issued at long and irregular intervals, and are, 
(with the exception of the last in the annexed list), reprints of papers 
originally read before The Literary and Philosophical Society of Liverpool, 
and published in its ‘Transactions,’ the Bulletin will be issued at more 
frequent intervals, and will contain articles not elsewhere published illus- 
trated, when necessary, with plain or coloured plates, and cuts in the text. 
The following are the titles of the ‘Museum Reports ’ :— 
(1) The Mollusca of the ‘ Argo’ Expedition to the West Indies. By the 
Rey. H. H. Higgins, M.A. 1877. 

