Dr. J. E. Gray on Museums and their Uses, 289 



the plan which I have proposed of placing all the specimens in the 

 scientific collection in boxes or drawers appropriated to them, and 

 rendering them thus at once and readily accessible to students at 

 large. 



I may observe that the late Mr. Swainson, who was the first to 

 raise the cry, lived to find that it was far more useful to keep his 

 own extensive collection of bird-skins in drawers, like his butterflies 

 and his shells; and that most scientific zoologists and osteologists 

 are now convinced that the skins of animals unmounted and kept in 

 boxes are far more useful for scientific purposes than stuffed skins 

 or set-up skeletons. 



So also, with reference to my proposal for the arrangement of the 

 Museum for the general public, I find that those who are desirous 

 of exhibiting their specimens to the best advantage are generally 

 adopting similar plans. 



Thus, when Mr. Gould determined on the exhibition of his mag- 

 nificent collection of Humming-birds, he at once renounced the 

 rank-and-file system, and arranged them in small glazed cases, each 

 case containing a genus, and each pane or side of the case showing 

 a small series of allied species, or a family group of a single 

 8j)ecies. 



\\'hen lately at Liverpool, I observed that the clever curator, 

 Mr. Moore, instead of keeping a single animal on each stand, has 

 commenced grouping the various specimens of the same species of 

 Mauimnlia together on one and the same stand, as several are 

 grouped in the British Museum, and thus giving far greater interest 

 to the group than the individual specimens would afford. 



In the British Museum, as an experiment with the view of testing 

 the feelings of the public and the scientific visitors, the species of 

 Nestor Parrots and of the Birds of Paradise, a family of Gorillas and 

 the Impeyan Pheasants, and sundry of the more interesting single 

 specimens, have been placed in isolated cases ; and it may readily 

 be seen that they have proved the most attractive cases in the 

 exhibition. 



In the Great Exhibition of 1862, Prof. Ilyrtl of Vienna exhibited 

 some framed cases of skeletons like those here recommended : one 

 contained the types of each family of Tortoises, another the principal 

 forms of Saurians, &c. They excited much interest, and were pur- 

 chased by our College of Surgeons. 



In some of the Continental museums also I have observed the 

 same plan adopted to a limited extent. 



I now exhibit a case of insects, received from Germany, in which 

 what I have suggested is fully carried out. You will perceive that 

 in one small case are exhibited simultaneously, and visible at a 

 glance, the egg, the larva, the plant on which it feeds, the pupa, 

 and the perfect moth, together with its varieties, and the parasites 

 by which the caterpillar is infested. Such cases, representing the 

 entire life and habits of all the best-known and most interestmg of 

 our native insects, would be, as I conceive, far more attractive and 

 instructive to the public at large than the exhibition of any con- 



Ann, ^' Mag. N. Hist. Ser.3. Fo/.xiv. 19 



