596 



NATURE 



[January 30, 19 13 



enllv, whilst if the collection is unnamed or of 

 o-reat rarity, a descriptive account in a catalogue 

 mav be necessary. 



Moreover, whilst the collections remained in 

 Bloomsbury the great library was at the command 

 of the staff, but the transference to South Ken- 

 sington wholly altered the situation. Even before 

 1882--;, indeed, a departmental library was known 

 to be a necessity for facility in working out the 

 collections. Accordingly, in 1879-81, a commence- 

 ment was made, and soon the library comprised 

 1700 titles, while at the end of the period embraced 

 in Dr. Glinthcr's history, and largely by his un- 

 ceasing efforts, there were 10,036 separate works, 

 or 16,238 volumes. The library is not only in- 

 dispensable to the staff, but many zoologists 

 outside — both British and foreign — have had their 

 labours lightened by the conveniences thus afforded 

 of consulting rare books, :is well ;is liy the courtesy 

 of the staff. 



But the care and custody of the nation's natural 

 his-tory coUfctions form only a part of the duty of 

 the staff, foi-, bei-ide> the select series for exhibi- 

 vion to the public, another for study by students 

 (using this term in its widest sense) has to be 

 arranged for, so as to leave those in the public 

 ijallerics untouched ; indeed, the exigencies of 

 space, as well as the importance of the system, 

 had caused Dr. Gray to adopt it so early as 1858. 

 IMoreover, descriptive catalogues, great and small, 

 with plates and text-figures of every group, have 

 10 be prepared for publication — for example, the 

 g^reat, and to workers the indispensable, catalogue 

 of fishes in many volumes, by the keeper himself 

 ^Dr. Giinther). Single volumes of some of these 

 publications, e.g., that on monotremes and mar- 

 supials, by Mr. Oldfield Thomas, represent the 

 labour of three years. Popular guides to the 

 various galleries, on the plan proposed by the 

 author of the history, that is, of a kind not only 

 useful to every intelligent visitor, but in most 

 ;ases of value to students of the department as 

 well as to those in charge of other museums, have 

 likewise to be prepared by the staff. Thus the 

 iiollections of the great museum are utilised from 

 'Various points of view. 



As we read those terse and pregnant pages of 

 Dr. Giinther's, a procession of great naturalists and 

 their collections passes before us in kaleidoscopic 

 ^arietv, and the familiar names of Sir Joseph 

 Banks, Mr. Cuming, Col. Beddome, Dr. Jerdon, 

 John Gould, A. R. Wallace, Mr. Hew^itson, A. 

 Hume, Messrs. Godman and Salvin, George Busk, 

 Joshua .^Ider, Dr. Sclater, Dr. Gwyn Jeffrys, 

 F. Day, Dr. John Anderson, and Lords Tweeddale, 

 Lilford and Walsingham, and many others recall 

 in each case a life-long devotion to particular 

 groups. 



Further, a long scries of expeditions by sea and 

 by land — from the Arctic to the Antarctic regions, 

 as well as in the neighbouring waters and coun- 

 tries, besides the circumnavigating voyage of 

 H.M.S. ChaUenrrer — have poured their riches 

 into this great museum, which also received 

 notable increments from the collections made by 



■^o. 2257, VOL. go] 



the East India Company, the Linnean Society, 

 and the great Fisheries Exhibition of 1883. 

 Mammals, "from the Huge whales, elephants and 

 giraffes to the tiny marsupials, rodents and in- 

 sectivores, find their place in this vast array, and 

 so throughout the orders of mammals, the endless 

 series of birds, reptiles, amphibians and fishes. 

 The vast numbers of invertebrates, from cuttle- 

 fishes and shells, insects and crabs to corals, 

 sponges and foraminifera, can only be estimated 

 by the records in this volume. Not a few collec- 

 tions typify the Colonial possessions and depend- 

 encies of the Empire — from New Zealand to South 

 America, Canada, Egypt, and India ; whilst the 

 native animals — land, fresh-water, and marine — 

 have each a place in the series. 



The period embraced by this treatise is of special 

 interest, since it covers the erection of the fine 

 Natural History Museum at South Kensington 

 and the preparation of the plans for the furniture 

 and fittings Ijv the keeper, as well as the removal 

 of the vast collections from their old quarters in 

 Bloomsbury to their new premises in South Ken- 

 sington. This task, carefully planned and skilfully 

 carried out in about six months by Dr. Giinther, 

 without appreciable injury, is one that redounds 

 to the credit of the keeper — whether in respect to 

 the delicacv of many of the specimens, or the dis- 

 tance to be traversed in the streets of a busy city. 

 The larger forms, perhaps, gave less anxiety than 

 the dried and brittle corals, echinoderms and 

 sponges, and, still more, the 52,635 jars and bottles 

 of all sizes containing specimens in spirit. Dr. 

 Giinther thus well merited the congratulations of 

 the trustees on this feat. In the material of the 

 cases of the new museum a change from metal (re- 

 commended by the keeper) to mahogany was made 

 by the trustees, probably on the grounds of 

 economy; and for the same reason the reduction 

 of the size of the separate building for the spirit 

 collections, as Sir R. Owen, Dr. Gray and Dr. 

 Giinther foresaw, caused an extension of double 

 the amount ten years later. .A cetacean room had 

 also to be improvised for these huge mammals. 



Further, the system whereby the selected 

 duplicates in every group, from primates to pro- 

 tozoa, arc distributed to home and to Colonial 

 museums was put in active operation, and 

 not a few university and other museums have 

 reason to bo gratefulto the trustees for this great 

 privilege. 



The three volumes following Dr. Giinther's are 

 typical examples of the important publications of 

 the muscimi. The catalogue of mammals of 

 Western Europe, by Gerrit S. Miller, of the 

 United .States National Museum at Washington, 

 is a laborious and exact treatise, the origin of 

 which is larsjelv due to the efforts of Lord Lilford, 

 Mr. Oldfield Thomas and Major Barrett-Hamilton. 

 All the mammals except the cetaceans, seals and 

 introduced forms, like Simia sylvmius. from the 

 Rock of Gibraltar, are entered, and the manner in 

 which the task has been executed is worthy of all 

 praise — in regard to both descriptions and figures. 

 As an instance of modern nomenclature, Orycfo-- 



