1 76 LIFE OF FLOWER 



has a most important bearing on the management of 

 local museums : 



"The scope of the museum," observes Sir William, 

 " should be strictly defined and limited ; there must be 

 nothing like the general miscellaneous collection of 

 4 curiosities/ thrown indiscriminately together, which 

 constituted the old-fashioned country museum. I think 

 we are all agreed as to the local character predominating. 

 One section should contain antiquities and illustrations 

 of local manners and customs ; another section, local 

 natural history, zoology, botany, and geology. The 

 boundaries of the county will afford a good limit 

 for both. Everything not occurring in a state of nature 

 within that boundary should be rigorously excluded. 

 In addition to this, it may be desirable to have a small 

 general collection designed and arranged specially for 

 elementary instruction in science." 



These words of warning deserve, in the present 

 writer's opinion, more attention than they have yet 

 received at the hands of those responsible for the ad- 

 ministration of not a few local museums. 



It may be added that Flower was of opinion that 

 ordinary local museums should not undertake original 

 research work, which should be reserved for the larger 

 establishments in our chief cities and the metropolis. 

 With the means at their disposal often insufficient 

 even for the proper functions local museums should 

 have quite enough to do in illustrating local products. 



Not that Sir William Flower was of opinion that, in 

 our larger cities, museums of a totally different nature 

 from the local museum on the one hand and from the 

 general museum on the other, may not have a justifi- 



