IV 

 SCHOOL MUSEUMS 1 



HAVING lately been asked by Dr. Warre, Head Master of Eton, 

 to give him some assistance in the fitting up, arrangement, 

 and management of the museum about to be inaugurated at 

 that College, I put down some notes which he was pleased 

 to think might be of use in pointing out the lines that should 

 be followed with most advantage. As these notes are equally 

 applicable to other school museums, I venture to publish them 

 for the information of those who may be in a position to profit 

 by them, premising that they are mere outlines, which are 

 susceptible of much elaboration in detail, and of some modifica- 

 tions, according to special circumstances. 



The subjects best adapted for such a museum are zoology, 

 botany, mineralogy, and geology. 



Everything in the museum should have some distinct 

 object, coming under one or other of the above subjects, 

 and under one or other of the series defined below, and 

 everything else should be rigorously excluded. The curator's 

 business will be quite as much to keep useless specimens out of 

 the museum as to acquire those that are useful. 



The two series or categories under which the admissible 

 specimens should come are the following: (1) Specimens 

 illustrating the teaching of the natural history subjects 

 adopted in the school, arranged in the order in which the 

 subjects are, or ought to be, taught. (2) Some special sets of 

 specimens of a nature to attract boys to the study of such 

 branches of natural history as readily lie in the path of their 



1 Suggestions for the formation and arrangement of a museum of Natural 

 History in connection with a Public School. Nature, vol. xli. p. 177 (1889). 



