432 



NA TURE 



[February io, 1910 



IHE OXFORD UNIVERSITY MUSEUM.' 

 ■ r^EW biUdings devoted to the pursuit of science 

 -T iiave a more interesting- history or a more dis- 

 tinct individuality than the Oxford University 

 Museun:. It is the resultant of many of the most 



Fig 1 



-The Oxford Musi 



uth- 



Structure itself, which is Gothic both in conception 

 and in detail, in the blend of the conventional and 

 the realistic in its scheme of decoration, and in the 

 array of statues which, forming- an integral part of 

 the design, carry the mind of the observer from 

 Hunter and Harvey 

 back through the ages to 

 Hippocrat&s and Aris- 

 totle. But the outlook 

 of the University is to 

 the future as well as to 

 the past, and in the 

 various annexes which 

 have sprung up around 

 the original building we 

 see evidence of a desire 

 to "let the dead bury 

 their dead," and te -enter 

 frankly upon the task 

 of meeting modern re- 

 quirements with a single 

 eve to practical efficiency. 

 Still, whatever scientific 

 developments may yet be 

 in store, the Museum 

 Court will, we may hope, 

 always remain to testify 

 to the fact that the future 

 will be none the worse 

 for having some of its 

 roots in the past. It 

 must be confessed that 

 the organisation of scien- 

 tific study in the univer- 

 sity has hardly kept 

 pace with the growth 

 of scientific appliances. 

 There is still too much clinging to respectable but 

 antiquated methods in the system of college tuition, 

 and, above all, in that of examinations. A 



From "A History of the OxTord Mus. 



characteristic activities, and embodies some of the 

 most earnest aspirations of the latter half of the nine- 

 teenth century. The two chief lines of scientific and 

 artistic effort which converged 

 upon Benjamin Woodward 's 

 Gothic pile found their most 

 typical exponents in .\cland and 

 Ruskin ; each of them a genuine 

 enthusiast, each with not a few 

 of the faults of his qualities, and 

 each destined to witness the 

 realisation of some of his ideals 

 and the failure of others in the 

 fabric which forms an appro- 

 priate monument of their life- 

 long association. 



The newer buildings which at 

 the present day are grouping 

 themselves around the central 

 structure of the museum consti- 

 tute with it an apt symbol of the 

 manner in which the university 

 has. responded to the needs of 

 scientific research and education 

 in modern times. Oxford can 

 never forget that she inherits :i 

 great tradition — literary and 

 artistic, as well as philosophical. 

 When first aroused to a sense of 

 her responsibility in view of 

 modern scientific demands, her 

 main endeavour was to graft 

 the new upon the old. No 



visitor to the original part of the museum can I promising field of university reform lies open in this 

 fail to recognise the outcome of this spirit in the direction. 



t of the Oxford Mu 



' A History of the Oxford Mu 



^ "A History of the Oxford Museum." By Dr. H. M. Vernon and I i'^..i u i u r * ^i" ■ l-i * *• - 



K. Dorothea Vernon. Pp. 127. (0.^fo.d : Clarendon Press, 1-909.) Price. | '''"«; ^opk before US was the jubilee commernoration 



NO. 2102, VOL. 82] 



The occasion which prompted the publication of the 



ttle book before us was the jubilee commemoration 



of the foundation of the museum, held in October, 



