lx REPORT—1868. 
made to the Biological Section at Dundee; to which I would only add, 
that though the Zoological Collections are the finest in the world, and 
the Geological and Paleontological of prodigious extent and value, there are 
of the forty-five Trustees, only three who have any special knowledge what- 
soever of the branches of science these collections illustrate; that since Sir 
Joseph Banks’s death, nearly half a century ago, no Botanist has ever been 
appointed a Trustee, though the Banksian Herbarium and Botanical Library, 
then amongst the most valuable in Europe, were left by their owner to the 
nation; and, in fine, that the interests of Botany have by the Trustees been 
greatly neglected. 
Much as has been written upon the uses of museums, I believe that the 
subject is still far from being exhausted, for in the present state of education 
in this country, these appear to me to afford the only means of efficiently 
teaching to schools the elements of Zoology and Physiology. .I say in the 
present state of education, because I believe it will be many years before 
we have schoolmasters and mistresses trained to teach these subjects, and 
many more years before either provincial or private schools will be sup- 
plied with such illustrative specimens as are essential for the teacher’s 
purposes. 
Confining myself to the consideration of provincial and local museums, and 
their requirements for educational purposes, each should contain a connected 
series of specimens illustrating the principal and some of the lesser divisions 
of the Animal and Vegetable Kingdoms, so disposed in well-lighted cases, 
that an inquiring observer might learn therefrom the principles upon which 
animals and plants are classified, the relations of their organs to one another 
and to those of their allies, the functions of those organs, and other matters 
relating to their habits, uses, and place in the economy of nature. Such an 
arrangement has not been carried out in any museum known to me, though 
partially attained in that at Ipswich; it requires some space, many pictorial 
illustrations, magnified views of the smaller organs and their structure, and 
copious legible descriptive labels, and it should not contain a single specimen 
more than is wanted. The other requirements of a provincial museum 
are, complete collections of the plants and animals of the province, which 
should be kept entirely apart from the instructional series, and from eyery- 
thing else. 
The Curator of the Museum should be able to give elementary demonstra- 
tions (not lectures, and quite apart from any powers of lecturing that he may 
possess) upon this classified series, to schools and others, for which a fee 
should be charged, which should go to the support of the Institution. And 
the museum might be available (under similar conditions of payment) for 
lectures and other demonstrations. 
Did such an illustrated typical collection exist in your rich and well- 
arranged Norwich Museum,.I am sure that there is not an intelligent school- 
master in the city who would not see that his school profited by the demon- 
strator’s offices, nor a parent who would grudge the trifling fee. 
You boast of a superb collection of Birds of Prey; how much would the 
value of this be enhanced, were it accompanied by such an illustration of the 
nature, habits, and affinities of the Raptores, as might well be obtained by 
an exhibition of the skeleton and dissected organs of one Hawk and one Owl, 
so laid out and ticketed that a schoolboy should see the structure of their 
beak, feet, wings, feathers, bones, and internal organs—should see why it is 
that Hawks and Owls are preeminent amongst birds for powers of sight and 
of flight ; for circling and for swooping; for rapacity, voracity, and tenacity 
) 
1 
1 
D 
