PRESIDENTS ADDRESS. XXXIX 



Here let me call your attention to the most valuable and self- 

 sacrificing labors of Dr. MacGregor and Mr. Maynard Bowman in 

 connection with the library of this Institute. A few years ago, when 

 they began work upon it, it consisted of a small number of unclassified 

 reports from secieties in various parts of the world. It now includes a 

 large number of serial publications by scientific societies and other insti- 

 tutions, and numbers about 1,500 bound volumes with about as many 

 more unbound. These haee been placed in a room temporarily pro- 

 vided by Dalhousie College, and so arranged that any one desirous of 

 consulting any volume would be able to find it without the assistance of 

 the librarian. 



The work of bringing order out of the confusion that existed at 

 first, the cataloguing and labelling of so many books, searching and 

 sending abroad for missing numbers, was an immense labor, which if 

 performed by a paid expert would have cost several hundred, not less, 

 perhaps, than two thousand dollars. 



But in addition to all thi., the addresses of other societies had to 

 be searched and copies of our Transactions sent abroad to about 700 

 societies in all, by which means the number of valuable publications 

 received each year was more than doubled. Surely when these two 

 gentlemen have done so much, we may expect our provincial government 

 to supplement their efforts by the addition to this library each year of a 

 few hundred treatises. Thpn would it not be better that the library 

 thus enlarged should be taken over by the government, properly housed 

 and managed, and made free to the public 1 



Nor must I forget to say that the thanks of this Institute are due 

 to the Governors of Dalhousie College for the use of a room at a time 

 when our library became so large that it could no longer be kept in the 

 place which it formerly occupied. 



2. A properly conducted museum would do much to popularize 

 science in our midst. A collection of dusty, unlabelled, badly arranged 

 specimens does not amount to much and scarcely justifies the expense. 

 Such a museum is the deadest of all dead things. 



To be practically useful a museum requires a large, well-lighted, 

 readily accessible room. It should primarily contain typical specimens 

 of the most important natural bodies, arranged according to their 

 chemical or organic affinities, so that the student may learn from them 

 at a glance something of their relationship and the laws of nature 



