217 
talogue of the stone articles Dr. Petrie proposes to add a chap- 
ter on the clay urns found in ancient places of sepulture. As 
these objects belong to the pagan period, it appears more fitting 
to connect them with the class of stone articles than with any 
of the metallic groups. 
As regards the time when the Council has reason to ex- 
pect the execution of this plan, it will be most satisfactory to 
the Academy to hear that Dr. Petrie has pledged himself to 
devote his undivided attention to the preparation of the Cata- 
logue, and to deposit the manuscript of at least the first por- 
tion of it with the Committee of Publication before the Stated 
Meeting of the Academy, in March, 1852. 
It is hoped that the publication of Dr. Petrie’s Catalogue 
will accomplish several important ends. 
In the first instance, it will be a complete list of all the 
articles in the Museum, in which each specimen will have its 
own number. ‘Thus the safe keeping of the objects will be 
provided for, and we shall no longer be absolutely dependent, 
as we now are, on the vigilance and integrity of our Curator. 
Moreover, the visiters to the Museum will be able, by re- 
ference to the Catalogue, to ascertain the nature of each ob- 
ject, and satisfy the reasonable curiosity which our Collec- 
tion is so well calculated to excite. As the Academy is an 
institution which derives a part of its resources from the State, 
it is but just that its Collections should be made as available as 
possible for the use of the public. 
The introductory chapters to the several parts of the Cata- 
logue will render it, in a great measure, a manual of Irish 
archeology, diffusing sound information on this subject. When 
~ such knowledge becomes more general, many articles of anti- 
quarian interest will be saved from the fate to which they are 
now subject, through the ignorance of those into whose hands 
they fall. 
It may be added, that the publication of such a Catalogue 
