Sept. 12, 1889] 



NATURE 



463 



his place as President of Section D ; his address, which 

 promises to be one of much interest, will be read by one 

 of the Vice-Presidents. The proceedings in this Section, 

 it is expected, will be somewhat lively ; more than one 

 paper will be read on certain aspects of Darwinism, and, 

 as vigorous controversialists of different schools will be 

 present, some strong speaking may be looked for. 



So far as the efforts of the Local Committee go, the 

 meeting ought to be a success. It is evident that every- 

 thing has been done, so far as the accommodation of 

 Newcastle permits, for the convenience and comfort of 

 the visitors. The Durham College of Medicine makes 

 very excellent Reception and Reading Rooms. Smoking 

 Rooms, Luncheon Rooms, and other conveniences that 

 conduce to the comfort of visitors, have been provided 

 and well equipped. The St. George's Drill Hall is large 

 enough for the opening address and the lectures, but the 

 quality of its acoustic properties is feared. One of the 

 great social events of the meeting will be the banquet 

 given by Lord Armstrong, on Thursday night, to 200 

 guests ; while the favourite excursion is that to Durham 

 on Saturday, when the Warden and Professors of the 

 University will entertain 200 at lunch. Regret is ex- 

 pressed that the excursion to the Roman Wall has not 

 been fixed for the Saturday instead of the Thursday. 

 Indeed, the Thursday excursions — to Berwick, Bam- 

 burgh, Holy Island, Barnard Castle, and other places 

 — are likely to induce many visitors to stay over that 

 day. 



Geologists are looking forward with much interest to 

 Dr. A. Geikie's paper on his recent visit to Norway, as 

 well as to Prof James Geikie's address as President of 

 the Section. Prof. Flower's address will be devoted 

 mainly to the arrangement of Museums. 



It may be worthy of note that the Economical Section 

 will be conducted on much more scientific lines than has 

 been hitherto the case. 



Inaugural Address by Prof. W. H. Flower, C.B., 

 LL.D., F.R.S., F.R.C.S., Pres.Z.S., F.L.S., F.G.S., 

 President. 



It is twenty-six years since this Association met in Newcastle- 

 upon-Tyne. It had then the advantage of being presided over 

 by one of the most distinguished and popular of your fellow- 

 townsmen. 



Considering the age usually attained by those upon whom the 

 honour of the presidency falls, and the length of time which 

 elapses before the Association repeats its visit, it must have 

 rarely happened that anyone who has held the office is spared, 

 not only to be present at another meeting in the town in which 

 he has presided, but also to take such an active part in securing 

 its success, and to extend such a hospitable welcome to his 

 successor, as Lord Armstrong has done upon the present occasion. 



The address which was delivered at that meeting must have 

 been full of interest to the great majority of those present. It 

 treated of many subjects more or less familiar and important to 

 the dwellers in this part of the world, and it treated them with 

 the hand of a master, a combination which always secures the 

 attention of an audience. 



"When it came to my knowledge that in the selection of the 

 Presiderit for this meeting the choice had fallen upon me, I was 

 filled with apprehension. There was nothing in my previous 

 occupations or studies from which I felt that I could evolve any- 

 thing in special sympathy with what is universally recognized as 

 the prevailing genius of the district. I was, however, somewhat 

 reassured when reminded that in the regular rotation by which 

 the equal representation in the presidential office of the diffisrent 

 branches of science included in the Association is secured, the 

 turn had come round for some one connected with biological 

 subjects to occupy the chair, which during the past seven years 

 has been filled with such distinction by engineers, chemists, 

 physicists, mathematicians, and geologists. I was also reminded 

 that the Association, though of necessity holding its meeting in 

 some definite locahty, was by no means local in its character, but 

 that its sphere was co-extensive, not with the United Kingdom 

 only, but with the whole of the British Dominions, and that our 



proceedings are followed with interest wherever our language is 

 understood — I may say, throughout the civilized world. Further- 

 more, although its great manufacturing industries, the eminence 

 of its citizens for their skill and intelligence in the practical ap- 

 plication of mechanical sciences, and the interesting and im- 

 portant geological features of its vicinity, have conferred such 

 fame on Newcastle as almost to have overshadowed its other 

 claims to distinction in connection with science, this neighbour- 

 hood is also associated with Bewick, with Johnson, with Alder, 

 Embleton, Hutton, Atlhey, Norman, the two Hancocks, the 

 two Bradys, and other names honoured in the annals of biology ; 

 it has long maintained a school of medicine of great repute ; and 

 there has lately been established here a natural history museum, 

 which in some of its features is a model for institutions of the 

 kind, and which, I trust, will be a means of encouraging in this 

 town some of the objects the Association was designed to 

 promote. 



There can be no doubt that among the various methods by 

 which the aims of the British Association (as expressed in its full 

 title, the advancement of :cienre) may be brought about, the col- 

 lection and preservation of objects available for examination, 

 study, and reference — in fact, the formation of what are now 

 called "museums" — is one of very great practical importance ; 

 so much so, indeed, that it seems to me one to the consideration 

 of which it is desirable to devote some time upon such an occa- 

 sion as this. It is a subject still little understood, though, 

 fortunately, beginning to attract attention. It has already 

 been brought before the notice of the Association, both in Presi- 

 dential and Sectional addresses. A committee of our members 

 is at the present time engaged in coilecling evidence upon it, and 

 has issued some valuable reports. During the present year an 

 association of curators and others interested in museums has been 

 founded for the purpose of interchange of ideas upon the 

 organization and management of these institutions. It is a 

 subject, moreover, if I may be allowed to mention a personal 

 reason for bringing it forward this evening, which has more than 

 any other occupied my time and my attention almost from the 

 earliest period of my recollection, and I think you will agree 

 with the opinion of one of my distinguished predecessors in this 

 chair, "that the holder of this office will generally do better by 

 giving utterance to what has already become part of his own 

 thought than by gathering matter outside of its habitual range 

 for the special occasion. For," continued Mr. Spottiswoode, 

 "the interest (if any) of an address consists not so much in the 

 multitude of things therein brought forward as in the individu- 

 ality of the mode in which they are treated." 



The first recorded institution which bore the name of museum, 

 or temple or haunt of the Muses, was that founded by Ptolemy 

 Soter at Alexandria about 300 B.C. ; but this was not a museum 

 in our sense of the word, but rather, in accordance with its 

 etymology, a place appropriated' to the cultivation of learning, or 

 which was frequented by a society or academy of learned men 

 devoting themselves to philosophical studies and the improve- 

 ment of knowledge. 



Although certain great monarchs, as Solomon of Jerusalem 

 and Augustus of Rome, displayed their taste and their magni- 

 ficence by assembling together in their palaces curious objects 

 brought from distant parts of the w orld — although it is said that 

 the liberality of Philip and Alexander supplied Aristotle with 

 abundant materials for his researches— of the existence of any 

 permanent or public collections of natural objects among the 

 ancients there is no record. Perhaps the nearest approach to 

 such collections may be found in the preservation of remarkable 

 specimens, sometimes associated with superstitious veneration, 

 sometimes with strange legendary stories, in the buildings de- 

 voted to religious worship. The skins of the gorillas brought by 

 the navigator Hanno from the West Coast of Africa, and hung 

 up in the temple at Carthage, afford a well-known instance. 



With the revival of learning in the Middle Ages, the collect- 

 ing instinct, inborn in so many per.-ons of various nations and 

 periods of history, but so long in complete abeyance, sprang into 

 existence with considerable vigour, and a museum, now meaning 

 a collection of miscellaneous objects, antiquities as well as 

 natural curiosities, often associated with a gallery of sculpture 

 and painting, became a fashionable appendage to the establish- 

 ment of many wealthy persons of superior culture. 



All the earliest collections, comparable to what we call 

 museums, were formed by ar,d maintained at the expense of 

 private individuals: sometimes physicians, whose studies naturally 

 led them to a taste for biological science ; often great merchant 



