REPOET OF ASSISTANT SECEETARY. 9 



value of the collectious for study by specialists, and for general educa- 

 tional purposes. The need of a larger fund for the purchase of speci- 

 mens is yearly more manifest. Exceedingly important material is 

 constantly offered to us at prices very much below what it would cost 

 to obtain it by collecting, and in many instances, when refused, it is 

 eagerly taken by the museums and institutions of Europe. 



The most enlightened nations of Europe do not hesitate to. spend 

 money liberally to promote the interests of their national museums. 



For the purchase of specimens for the South Kensington Museum 

 from 1853 to 1887 $1,586,634 was expended ; or a yearly average of 

 nearly $47,000. 



Toward her other museums England is equally liberal. Exact 

 statistics are not at hand, but it is quite within bounds to assert that 

 her average expenditures for the purchase of new objects for museums 

 in London is not less than $500,000 a year. 



The museums of England are rich with the accumulations of cen- 

 turies. The National Museum of the United States is young and has 

 enormous deficiencies in every department. It needs, more than any 

 museum in Europe, the opportunity to increase its resources through 

 purchase. The total amount expended for the purchase of specimens 

 for the National Museum since its foundation has not exceeded $20,000, 

 and never in one year more than $8,500. 



More has been expended for the improvement of two museums in 

 the city of New York in the past four years than has ever been expended 

 by the general Government upon the Museum in Washington. 



Within the past year three mortifying instances have occurred of the 

 inability of the National Museum to buy specimens needed to complete 

 its collections. 



A verj^ valuable collection of minerals, absolutely essential to the 

 national collections and for some years on deposit in the National 

 Museum, was withdrawn by its owner and placed in a school museum 

 in a neighboring city, because $4,000 could not be had for its purchase — 

 a sum far below its value. 



A collection of implements and weapons illustrating the history of 

 the natives of Alaska, gathered by an officer in the U. S. Navy, and 

 almost indispensable for the completion of the national ethnological 

 collection, was sold to a museum in a neighboring city for $12,000, 

 while the National Museum had no money to expend for such objects. 



One of the most important collectious of birds in America, the loss of 

 which was a national misfortune, was taken from the city of Washing- 

 ton and sold to the British Museum for $10,000, no American institu- 

 tion having money available for its purchase. 



Instances of this kind occur nearly every month in every year. 



The National Museum has had the option for several years of the 

 purchase at cost of $80,000 of a collection of minerals, which once 

 acquired would enable its mineralogical department to rank among the 

 first in the world. Congress has never been asked to make an appro- 



