REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1914. 13 
our homes. The object of these collections and of the work that will 
be put upon them is both cultural and practical, and, as in the more 
progressive of the countries of the Old World, they are in large part 
designed to furnish very material aid toward the promotion and bet- 
terment of art and industrial pursuits in the United States. 
For its public exhibitions the department has been allotted the 
entire floor and gallery space in the older Museum building and the 
three lower halls in the Smithsonian building. The latter will be 
used by the division of graphic arts, but owing to extensive repairs 
and alterations under way the installation of the materials of this 
division has necessarily been deferred and an account of them must 
be left for a future report. In this connection, therefore, attention 
can be directed only to the conditions in the Museum building and to 
the work there in progress. Before so doing, however, it is impor- 
tant to explain that ample as may seem the accommodations for ex- 
pansion afforded by these two buildings the time is near when, in the 
ordinary course of events, these facilities will be entirely exhausted. 
But the extraordinary must also be looked for, and as instances may 
be cited the tender, since the close of the year, of a collection of 
extreme historical importance, valued at many thousands of dollars, 
which alone would fill one of the large halls, and there is also another 
collection consisting mainly of works of art of at least the same 
extent and of even greater value, bequeathed to the Museum, for 
which there will be no suitable place in either building. ‘These con- 
ditions operate to the disadvantage of the Museum in two directions 
in respect to the arts and industries. Great gifts can not be solicited 
with the knowledge that no place exists for their accommodation, 
while, on the other hand, would-be benefactors are deterred from 
making presents for the same reason. The public has fully 
awakened to the possibilities of its Museum, and to the benefits which 
it might, and to a large extent already does, confer, and it is solely 
in the interest of the public welfare that the Museum seeks to increase 
its opportunities for doing good. 
A detailed account of the older Museum building was published 
in the annual report for 1908. Its principal features with special 
reference to the interior are briefly as follows: The main part of 
the building is square, measuring 300 feet long on each side, and con- 
sists of a single story, varying greatly in height in its different sec- 
tions. At each corner of the square is a relatively large pavilion and 
in the middle of each facade is a broad tower which project 124 feet 
from the main building line and increase the length of each frontage 
to 325 feet. Architecturally the building, which is of brick, consists 
of a central rotunda from which four naves extend in the direction 
of the four main points of the compass, in the form of a Greek 
cross. Following the outer walls and connecting the naves are eight 
