THE HANCOCK MUSEUM AND ITS HISTORY 111 



by Mr. Frederic Raine, the herbarium of N. J. Winch (a cele- 

 brated Newcastle botanist of the early nineteenth century), 

 and such noted collections of local fossils as those of William 

 Hutton, J. W, Kirkby, and Thomas Atthey. All these, 

 together with much other similar material, illustrate the im- 

 portance of the Hancock Museum as a scientific storehouse. 

 In its capacity as an institution for guiding and inspiring the 

 ordinary non-technical visitor it has not yet reached anything 

 like the full development of which it is capable, for the simple 

 reason that the Society which owns it has never yet been able 

 to pay for the necessary specimens and the necessary work. 

 It is only within quite recent times in fact that any museum 

 of natural history has taken this side of its duty seriously ; 

 and considering that it has had to rely almost entirely on gifts 

 for its material, the Hancock Museum does already put before 

 its visitors a selection of natural objects that is quite remark- 

 able for the degree of completeness with which it represents 

 the marvellous variety of nature. The most important future 

 work of this museum, as of so many others, must lie in the 

 direction of making its contents more self-explanatory, and so 

 more truly educative. 



It will be seen that the Natural History Society has its full 

 share of responsibilities ; and during the seventy-seven years 

 of its existence it has done a great deal in fulfilment of them. 

 Its activities fall under two main heads, which may roughly 

 be described as public and private. Its public object is the 

 general encouragement of natural history interests in its 

 district. What we are calling by contrast its private object 

 is the special investigation of the local natural history — of the 

 multitudinous elements of the fauna, flora, and geology of 

 Northumberland and Durham. Work under the first head, 

 its public work, has always been limited by the modesty of 

 the Society's resources. Often it has been almost confined to 

 the maintenance of a museum which the public might use 

 and where information could be obtained. This in itself is 

 an important service to have performed, as is proved by the 

 number of people who refer to the Society's museum as having 



