PEOCEEDINGS OF UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 9 



It does not, of course, behoove a great national enterprise of the 

 character I have tried to describe to play the part of a solicitor, nor can 

 it go from collector to collector and beg for contributions for its cases. 

 Still, without directly askiug such an enlightened mass of people as our 

 own, it counts a great deal on private support. It believes that there 

 are many people in this country — men of means, of intelligence — who, 

 if they understood what is the aim of this museum — that of national 

 education — they would gladly send to it their collections, or, knowing 

 what particular class of objects the institution was desirous of securing, 

 would come forward spontaneously and give it their aid. 



That this is absolutely the case, and that such praiseworthy generos- 

 ity does exist, I can myself testify to. Already some of the leading 

 manufacturers of the country are sending forward collections of the 

 objects they produce. The museum authorities exercise a choice in their 

 selection, and deprecate anything that might assimilate the museum to 

 an industrial exhibition, or, in other words, that one class of objects 

 should be received in competition with another. What is to be taken 

 by the museum is to be the best, and only one particular class of objects 

 illustrative of a class of industry is to be accepted. 



In the innumerable details necessary to render this museum efifective 

 and at the same time uniform, a type of case made under its direction 

 is provided, and all the bottles, &c., or mountings, are provided by the 

 museum. The work of arrangement and classification is already going 

 on with great ra])idity, and the publicity given to the museum is already 

 bringing many visitors to it. Befoi'e long, in a series of cases will be 

 arranged the musical instruments, the United States having fallen heir 

 to a very curious collection coming from the East. The labor which is 

 entailed on the officers of the museum is very heavy. Just as rapidly 

 as possible new centers illustrating a particular subject are made, and 

 with one case filled, others group themselves around it. The curators 

 are amazed at the riches which have been stowed away in the vaults 

 and lumber-rooms of the various departments in Washington, and there 

 is every reason to suppose that when, in time, they can push their ex- 

 plorations other mines of wealtli will be discovered. Many of these 

 things have existed for the last twenty years, nailed up in boxes or tied 

 up in portfolios, and not a human soul has been the wiser for then. 



I have been obliged to repeat how immense is this plan, how wide is 

 the ground it covers, how different are the subjects it includes, and, in 

 order to make myself better understood, I give the list of the officers of 

 the National Museum, with the various departments under their charge : 



Spencer F. Baird, Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, Director 

 of the Museum 5 G. Brown Goode, Assistant Director, Curator, Depart- 

 ment of Arts and Industries; Tarleton H. Bean, Curator, Department 

 of Fishes; William H. Dall, Honorary Curator, Department of Mol- 

 lusks; Frederick P. Dewey, Assistant, Department of Minerals and 

 Economic Geology ; James M. Flint, Honorary Curator, Section of Ma- 



