Sept. 27, 1888] 



NATURE 



517 



It produces nothing but confusion in the minds of those who 

 wander through its long galleries with but little knowledge of 

 the periods to which the objects contained in them relate. The 

 necessity of storing all that can be obtained, and all that is pre- 

 sented to them in the way of specimens, precludes the possibility 

 of a scientific or an educational arrangement. 



By the published returns of the Museum it appears that there 

 has been a gradual falling off in the number of visitors since 1882, 

 when the number was 767,873, to 1887, when it had declined to 

 501,256. This may be partly owing to the increased claims of 

 bands and switchbacks upon public attention, but it cannot be 

 owing to the removal of the Natural History Museum to South 

 Kensington, as has been suggested, because the space formerly 

 occupied 1 y those collections at Bloomsbury has been since 

 filled with objects of greater general interest, and the galleries 

 have been considerably enlarged. 



The Science and Art Department at South Kensington has 

 done much for higher education, but for the education of the 

 masses it is of no more use than the British Museum, for the 

 same reason, that its collections are not arranged in sequence, 

 and its galleries are not properly adapted for such an arrange- 

 ment. Besides these establishments, annual exhibitions on a 

 prodigious scale have been held in London for many years, at an 

 enormous cost, but at the present time not the slightest trace of 

 these remain, and I am not aware of any permanent good that 

 has resulted from them. If one-tenth of the cost of these 

 temporary exhibitions had been devoted to permanent collections, 

 we should by this time have the finest industrial museum in the 

 world. Throughout the whole series of these annual temporary 

 collections, only one, viz. the American department of the 

 Fisheries Exhibition, was arranged upon scientific principles, 

 and that was arranged upon the plan adopted by the National 

 Museum at Washington. It appears probable from the 

 experience of the present year that these annual exhibitions are 

 on the decline. Large iron buildings have been erected in 

 different places, some of which would meet all the requirements 

 of a permanent museum. The Olympia occupies 3 \ acres, the 

 Italian Exhibition as much as 7 acres. There can be little 

 doubt, I think, that the long avenues of potted meats and other 

 articles of commonplace merchandise, which now constitute the 

 chief part of the objects exhibited in these places, must before 

 long cease to be attractive, and must be replaced by something 

 else, and in view of such a change I venture to put in a plea for 

 a National Anthropological Museum upon a large scale, using the 

 term in its broadest sense, arranged stratigraphically in concentric 

 rings. It is a large proposal, no doubt, but one which, 

 considering the number of years I have devoted to the sub- 

 ject, I hope I shall not be thought presumptuous in submitting 

 for the consideration of the Anthropological Section of this 

 Association. 



The Palaeolithic period being the earliest, would occupy the 

 central ring, and having fewer varieties of form would require 

 the smallest space. Next to it the Neolithic and Bronze Ages 

 would be arranged in two concentric rings, and would contain, 

 besides the relics of those periods, models of prehistoric monu- 

 ments, bone caves, and other places interesting on account of 

 the prehistoric finds that have been made in them. After that, 

 in expanding order, would come Egyptian, Greek, Assyrian, and 

 Roman antiquities, to be followed by objects of the Anglo-Saxon, 

 Frank ish, and Merovingian periods ; these again in develop- 

 mental outward expansion would be surrounded by mediaeval 

 antiquities, and the outer rings of all might then be devoted 

 to showing the evolution of such modern arts as coutd be placed 

 in continuity with those of antiquity. 



In order that the best objects might be selected to represent 

 the different periods and keep up the succession of forms which 

 would constitute the chief object of the Museum, I would confine 

 the exhibition chiefly to casts, reproductions, and models, the 

 latter being, in my opinion, a means of representing primitive 

 arts, which has not yet been sufficiently made use of, but which 

 in my own small local museum at P'arnham, Dorsetshire, I have 

 employed to a considerable extent, having as many as twenty- 

 three models, similar to those now exhibited, of places in which 

 things have been found within an area of two miles. 



_ The several sections and rings would be superintended by 

 directors and assistants, whose function it would be to obtain re- 

 productions and models of the objects best adapted to display 

 the continuity of their several arts and periods ; and the arts 

 selected for representation should be those in which this continuity 

 could be most persistently adhered to. Amongst these the 



following might be named : pottery, architecture, house furniture, 

 modes of navigation, tools, weapons, weaving apparatus, painting, 

 sculpture, modes of land transport and horse furniture, ornamen- 

 tation, personal ornament, hunting and fishing apparatus, machin- 

 ery, fortification, modes of burial, agriculture, ancient monuments' 

 domestication of animals, toys, means of heating and of providing 

 liidit, the use of food, narcotics, and so forth. 



Miscellaneous collections calculated to confuse the several 

 series, and having no bearing on development, should be avoided, 

 but physical anthropology, relating to man as an animal, might 

 find its place in the several sections. 



I have purposely avoided in my brief sketch of this scheme 

 giving unnecessary details. Any cut-and-dried plan would have 

 to be greatly altered, according to the possibilities of the case, 

 when the time for action arrived. My object is to ventilate the 

 general idea of a large Anthropological Rotunda, which I have 

 always thought would be the final outcome of the activity which 

 has shown itself in this branch of science during the last few 

 years, and which I have reason to believe is destined to come 

 into being before long. In such an institution the position of 

 each phase of art development shows itself at once by its distance 

 from the centre of the space, and the collateral branches would 

 be arranged to merge into each other according to their 

 geographical positions. 



The advantages of such an institution would be appreciated, 

 not by anthropologists and archaeologists only. It would adapt 

 itself more especially to the limited time for study at the disposal 

 of the working classes, for whose education it is unnecessary to 

 say that at the present time we are all most deeply concerned. 

 Although it is customary to speak of working men as uneducated, 

 education is a relative term, and it is well to remember that in 

 all that relates to the material arts they have, in the way of 

 technical skill and handicraft, a better groundwork for appre- 

 ciating what is put before them than the upper classes. That 

 they are able to educate themselves by means of a well-arranged 

 Museum, my own experience, even with the imperfect arrange- 

 ments that have been at my command, enables me to testify. 

 Anything which tends to impress the mind with the slow growth 

 and stability of human institutions and industries, and their 

 dependence upon antiquity, must, I think, contribute to check 

 revolutionary ideas, and the tendency which now exists, and 

 which is encouraged by some who should know better, to break 

 drastically with the past, and must help to inculcate Conservative 

 principles, which are urgently needed at the present time, if the 

 civilization that we enjoy is to be maintained and to be permitted 

 to develop itself. 



The next subject to which I would draw your attention is the 

 present working of the Act for the Preservation of Ancient 

 Monuments, with the carrying out of which I have been 

 intrusted during the last five years. 



It is unnecessary to speak of the measures that have been taken 

 in other countries which have preceded us in the work of pro- 

 tecting ancient monuments. Their system of land tenure and 

 division of property is different from ours, and the same measures 

 are not equally applicable. 



In 1882 a Bill was passed through Parliament known as the 

 Ancient Monuments Act, to enable those who desired to do so, 

 to place the ancient monuments belonging to them under the pro- 

 tection of the Government, and to make it illegal for future 

 owners or others to destroy them : also to enable local magis- 

 trates to punish summarily, with a fine of ^5 or imprisonment 

 for one month, offences committed under the Act. No power is 

 taken to compel any owner to place his monument under the 

 Act, but provision is made for a small annual expenditure in 

 order to preserve the monuments offered voluntarily by their 

 owners. A schedule of certain monuments was attached to the 

 Act, without the consent of the owners, merely to indicate the 

 monuments to which the Act applied, but these, like any ethers, 

 had to be voluntarily offered before the Government could 

 accept them. Any other monuments not in the schedule could 

 be accepted, but only after the offer of them had been laid forty 

 days before Parliament, in order, I presume, that the country 

 might not become charged with the preservation of monuments 

 that were unworthy of protection. 



In November 1882, I was asked by Lord Stalbridge, in a 

 complimentary letter, written by desire of the Prime Minister, 

 to undertake the office of Inspector, intimating at the same time 

 that my position as landowner would place me in a favourable 

 position for dealing with other landowners to whom the monu- 



