4 TWO YEARS IN THE JUNGLE. 



two dozen skinning knives of various sizes. They were made of the 

 best shear steel by E. Blaydes & Co., and proved a valuable invest- 

 ment. 



At Liverpool we visited the Derby Museum, which is my ideal 

 of what a public museum ought to be. It is readily seen that no 

 effort has been spared to make it perfect in quality of both speci- 

 mens and fixtures, and one only regrets that Dr. Moore has not 

 unlimited funds at his disposal for the indefinite increase of the 

 quantity. The methods of installation happily combine attractive- 

 ness of display with economy of space. 



After that came London and its museums of all kinds. The city 

 is but a vast, inhospitable wilderness of brick, gloomy but not 

 grand, ancient but not attractive, redeemed from utter loneliness 

 only by its wonderful museums and galleries of art, and its gardens 

 of zoology and botanj-. Not even in the jungles of India, with only 

 half a dozen native followers, did I feel so utterly lonely as in the 

 heart of London's immensity, surrounded by nearly four million 

 human beings speaking my own language. 



The British Museum is undoubtedly the most complete of any 

 of its kind in existence, and always will be. It outranks all other 

 museums just as the Great Eastern surpasses in size and carrying 

 capacity all other ships. There is not now, and there never will be, 

 even in boastful, progi-essive America, another museum which can 

 even be compared with it as to size and scientific completeness. 

 Englishmen have a pride in this institution which reaches to the 

 bottom of their pockets, and this, with the dispersal of Englishmen 

 all over the world, has made it what it is. British consuls are 

 paid good salaries, from which they can and do afford to gather 

 valuable collections in foreign lands for the British Museum. So 

 long as our consuls are limited to the paltry salaries they now re- 

 ceive, for a year at a time, by the grace of Congress, they would be 

 very foolish to spend a dollar for the benefit of any American mu- 

 seum ; though they might, at a trifling expense, send collections to 

 the Smithsonian Institution which would make a magnificent mu- 

 seum in a year. More than this, the British Museum is allowed to 

 buy what it wants and cannot get by presentation, but the wisdom 

 of our Congress fails to provide for the purchase of a single speci- 

 men by the National Museum. What a glorious scheme for build- 

 ing up a national institution ! 



To a stranger, the extent and completeness of the British Mu- 

 seum's scientific collections are truly astonishing. Unless he is a 



