140 SIR WILLIAM FLOWER CHAP. 



organs of different animals being brought into juxtaposition for 

 comparison in a way which cannot be effected in the galleries, 

 where the specimens are necessarily arranged in systematic 

 zoological or botanical order. 



In such a series the illustrations will naturally be derived 

 equally from living and extinct forms. 



With regard to botany it is obvious that such an introductory 

 treatment will be equally applicable and instructive, as in zoology, 

 and should be in sequence with it in any general exposition of 

 the leading modifications of the organic world. 



The Keeper of Mineralogy 1 has already formed an admirably 

 arranged collection introductory to the study of his departments, 

 which, allowing for the great difference in the nature of the 

 subjects, gives a good idea of what an introductory collection to 

 the other departments may be. It is, however, arranged, not in 

 the Central Hall, but in a part of the gallery devoted to minerals. 

 The far superior illustrations of the specimens in their present 

 position to that which they would occupy in the bays of the 

 Central Hall, a matter which is of the utmost importance in the 

 case of minerals, is a strong reason against any disturbance of 

 the present arrangement. 



Flower's idea was to illustrate natural laws and 

 the facts of evolution on the lines which he had 

 originated in Lincoln's Inn Fields, the adaptations 

 of organs to function in all classes of animals, and 

 to deal with every modification of form in logical 

 series. He added to this later some striking 

 examples of the leading facts of variation under 

 domestication, protective coloration and form, and 

 of the structural laws of plants. 



Classification was also illustrated, and any striking 



1 Mr. L. Fletcher, F.R.S. Visitors to the Museum will find this 

 exquisitely illustrated concept of the underlying order in the mineral world 

 developed and extended in the Mineralogical Gallery, where the beauty to be 

 found in natural mineral products is also a most striking feature. 



