14 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1904. 



acquisitions. It has many friends, some the owners of large and 

 important collections, who have come to recognize that in an institu- 

 tion founded by the Government for all time their specimens will be 

 not only perpetually and securely cared for, but also at the service of 

 every specialist who needs to consult them. Officials of the Govern- 

 ment detailed for duty in the new possessions, rich in novelties of 

 nature and of culture, are giving thought to the wants of their National 

 Museum. By means of the duplicates, set aside as collections are 

 worked over, exchanges are made with other museums, whereby 

 important additions are obtained. The exhibition collections in some 

 branches, notably the historical, owe many of their most attractive 

 features to loans. These are not the property of the Museum and may 

 only remain in its possession for short periods; but the spirit of liber- 

 ality in this direction, long manifested, is growing steadily, until of 

 late it has sometimes been necessary to decline important deposits on 

 account of lack of room. This difficulty will be overcome upon the 

 completion of the new building, whose greater accommodations and 

 improved facilities will, it is hoped, prove an additional incentive to 

 the possessors of collections, large or small, which may be instructive 

 to the people. 



In appropriating for the large expositions, of which many have 

 been held in recent }^ears, there has been a general understanding on 

 the part of Congress that from the allotment to the National Museum 

 the Museum shall gain something of permanent value. By judicious 

 management, though the amounts have been small, the Museum has 

 secured many unique specimens which it could not have obtained in 

 any other way at its command. With several of the larger museums, 

 which are well supplied with funds, it is customary to send out 

 exploring expeditions even to distant regions, and some of these 

 investigations are conducted on a very extensive scale. They are an 

 important source of collections as well as of information, but the 

 National Museum has neither the funds nor a sufficiently large staff 

 to engage in such work except on a very small scale, generally in 

 connection with one or other of the Government surveying expedi- 

 tions, and with the object of obtaining material which these surveys 

 do not collect. 



There is one method of obtaining collections in which the National 

 Museum has been weak, while by such means all of the larger 

 museums of the world, whether national, municipal, or private, have 

 acquired a large proportion of their treasures. This is in the direct 

 expenditure of money for purchases. The importance of this method 

 is not realized by Congress, though it might be, were the matter 

 given thorough consideration and were the proper relations of the 

 Museum to those bureaus of the Government which are charged by 

 Congress with the investigation of agricultural, mining, fishery, and 



