Minerals. 349 



1880-1903. 



Keeper of Minerals. 



Lazarus Fletcher, M.A., F.R.S. . . . 1880-> 

 Assistants. 



Walter Flight, D.Sc., F.R.S ->1885 



Thomas Davies >1892 



Henry Maurice Platnauer, B.Sc.* . . 1880-83 



Henry Alexander Miers, M.A., F.R.S. f . 1882-95 



George Thurland Prior, M.A 1887 > 



Leonard James Spencer, M.A. . . . 1894 > 



George Frederick Herbert Smith, M.A. . . 1897 > 



After Mr. Maskelyne had retired from office, a step rendered 

 necessary by his candidature for the House of Commons, Mr. 

 Fletcher was promoted to the vacant keepership in June, 1880. 

 In the following month he was called upon to remove the 

 Minerals from Bloomsbury to South Kensington, and to rearrange 

 them in the new Natural History Museum. 



Some idea of the nature of this task may be formed if it be 

 pointed out that the cabinets of the table-cases at Bloomsbury 

 were to be made use of in the new Gallery, but that the glazed 

 table-tops were to be left behind ; that the new table-tops were 

 then lying on the gallery -floor at South Kensington, and had as 

 yet no supports ; that differences of illumination of the old and 

 new Galleries, and differences of construction of the cabinets, 

 made it necessary that the relative positions of the cabinets in 

 the Gallery at South Kensington should be completely different 

 from the relative positions in the Gallery at Bloomsbury ; that 

 every cabinet had for some time to be turned upside down 

 during the process of being fitted to the new floor ; that many of 

 them had to be cut in two because of the interference of the 

 structural columns of the Gallery, and new mahogany ends had 

 afterwards to be made and fitted to them. Such a series of 

 operations involves great practical difficulties when the specimens 

 to be removed and arranged are numerous, fragile, and require 

 to be cautiously handled, or are small portable, and of great 

 intrinsic value, and must be kept under lock and key. 



The transfer of the specimens and the fitting of the cabinets 

 to the floor having been accomplished, the exhibited portion of 

 the systematic collection was increased by the addition of 

 specimens selected from the reserve series in the drawers ; the 



* Curator of the York Museum. 



f Professor of Mineralogy at the University of Oxford. 



