ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 315 



are very secondary objects, although from the exhi- 

 bition of the former, at one shilling each person, 

 the public are tempted to believe it is much more 

 extensive than others, which can be seen for no- 

 thing : it nevertheless derives much interest to the 

 naturalist as containing the Sumatrian animals col- 

 lected by Sir Stamford Raffles, and the North Ame- 

 rican birds described by Richardson and Swainson. 

 Why these latter, collected at the public expense, 

 and therefore public property, should not have been 

 deposited in the National Museum, rather than have 

 been given to a society of private individuals, is an 

 enigma we cannot solve. That this donation was 

 made without any regard to the interests of science 

 is obvious from this simple fact, that, in their pre- 

 sent situation, the specimens can only be seen by 

 payment, nor can any scientific use be made of them 

 but by permission of the council, and " at the dis- 

 cretion of the secretary : " whereas, had they gone 

 to the British Museum, they might have been seen 

 gratis, and used freely, without any such formal, 

 tedious, and restricted regulations. The urbanity 

 and liberal feeling of the secretary, indeed, is well 

 calculated to, diminish the inconvenience of debar- 

 ring men of science from the free use of the materials 

 it possesses. It is well known that admission to the 

 privileges of a Fellow of the Zoological Society is a 

 matter of no great difficulty. The forms of recom- 

 mendation and election are observed, as in other 

 societies ; but they are little more than forms. Upon 

 the whole, however, the scientific character of the 

 society, within the last two years, has much improved, 

 and will doubtless continue so to do, as liberal feel- 



