FIFTY-FOURTH CONGRESS, 1895-1897. Lay 
these collections houseroom; and since the building in which they were 
kept is not fireproof, and the destruction of the collection would be 
an incalculable loss to science, there was nothing to do but to receive 
this, and up to the present time a considerable portion of the collection 
still remains in danger of destruction by fire, at the Department of 
Agriculture. 
There is also a large amount of other material which ought to be 
arranged for public exhibition in a fireproof building which is now in 
the inflammable wooden structure adjoining the Department of Agri- 
culture, and which the Secretary is desirous of transferring if accom- 
modation can be found for it. 
All the collections of the Geological Survey are stored in this build- 
ing, and a considerable number of the scientific experts employed by 
the Survey have office room and accommodations to enable them to 
study in the Museum building. These accommodations have become 
absolutely inadequate, and there is no more room to receive the collec- 
tions which the Director of the Survey deems absolutely necessary to 
have here in Washington in connection with his investigations of the 
material wealth of the country. 
The crowded condition of the exhibition halls has been dwelt upon, 
but that of the storage rooms is still more congested. In the base- 
ment of the old Smithsonian building, in its towers, and in various 
small rooms about the new building, there is a space equivalent to per- 
haps 200,000 cubic feet, crowded to its utmost capacity with boxed 
material. This material is all carefully recorded, and the location and 
contents of every box is definitely fixed, so that when necessary any 
desired object can be referred to; but satisfactory use of the collec- 
tions is impossible. In one basement room, for instance, are crowded 
50,000 skins of birds, and 50,000 in an adjacent gallery, altogether 
twelve times as many as are shown in the exhibition hall. So closely 
are they crowded that it is impossible even to rearrange them, and 
their study is attended with great difficulty. It is desired to separate 
from among these the duplicates for distribution to the colleges and 
schools throughout the country, and an attempt has been made to 
accomplish this, but it has been found practically impossible. 
The great collection of alcoholic fishes (the result in part of the 
explorations of the Fish Commission), the most extensive in America 
and one of the most extensive in the world, is stored in two basement 
rooms and only accessible with the greatest difficulty. Furthermore, 
the crowding of such a mass of alcoholic material in a small space is 
very dangerous, and in case of fire would lead to disastrous results. 
Properly equipped museums, like the British Museum in London, have 
a special fireproof building for collections of this kind, separate from 
other buildings, and provided with special devices for the prevention 
of fire. 
