FIFTY YEARS AGO AND TO-DAT. 119 



of research in our countiy that one is led to wonder that 

 a Single penny should ever be spent abroad for work of 

 this kind while so much remains to be done here. 



To come nearer home. At that time the unrivalled 

 ethnological collections of the East India Marine Society 

 could be got access to only by soliciting permission from 

 some one of its members, most of whom at that time were 

 scattered over the world in the interests of Salem's com- 

 merce. Now, through the liberality of the great Essex 

 philanthropist, in founding the Peabody Academy of Sci- 

 ence, and the wise administration of its trustees, these 

 invaluable collections are open daily, free to all, and a 

 throng of forty thousand people annually pours through 

 the open doors. Liberal provisions are made to augment 

 these collections and the additions in the past ten years 

 have outnumbered the original collection. The biological 

 collections of this society, as well, have been cared for in 

 the same manner and are equally accessible. 



As to the growth of the Institute it is a matter of wonder 

 and pride that, until recently without special funds, save 

 what it derived from the annual assessments of its mem- 

 bers, it should have obtained the position it holds to-day. 



It is almost pathetic to read the first address by Prof. 

 John L. Russell before the society in 1836, and see how 

 meagre were the possessions over which its members 

 were felicitating themselves. Mr. Russell speaks in glow- 

 ing terms of the "spacious and commodious halls, fur- 

 nished with elegant and useful cabinets" and the library 

 of one hundred volumes ! And this was absolutely all : 

 a few heroic members paying out of their own pockets 

 in disproportionate sums the funds necessary to sustain 

 even this display. How faintly could he have conceived 

 that within fifty years this society should have grown to 

 one of three hundred and forty members, with a library 



