14 



ACCOUNTS, ETC., OF THE BRITISH MUSEUM. 



VIII. — General Progress at the Museum, Bloomsbury 



The total number of visitors to the Museum in the year 

 1897 amounts to 586,437, a slight increase on the number for 

 1896, which as stated in the last Return was the highest 

 number reached since 1890. Of this total, the visitors on 

 Sunday afternoons were 37,594 ; and the visitors in the 

 week-day evenings, 26,254. The steady annual diminution 

 of the number of evening visitors has satisfied the Trustees 

 that they would not be justified in continuing to incur the 

 expense of keeping the galleries open in the evenings. From 

 the commencement of the present year therefore this service 

 has been abandoned, but the hours of day opening have been 

 extended to 6 p.m. on week-days throughout the year. 



The total number of visits of students to the Reading Room 

 during the year was 188,628, a further diminution by 2,735 on 

 the number of 1896, which had declined from the totals of 

 previous years. The daily average was about 624, as against 

 630 in 1896. 



The average numbers of persons in the room, counted at 

 certain hours in the afternoon, were : — 



4 P.M. 



5 P.M. 



6 P.M. 



6.30 P.M. 



7 P.M. 



7.30 P.M. 



349 



254 



168 



102 



Ill 



81 



The number of volumes, &c. supplied to readers in the 

 year was 1,419,159 as against 1,428,535 in 1896. 



There has been an increase in the total number of visits of 

 students to the several Departments other than the Reading 

 Room, amounting to 40,976 as against 37,130 in 1896. 



The substitution of skylights for windows which has been 

 in progress during the last few years in the northern rooms 

 on the upper floor has been effected in the Babylonian Room. 



The erection of a separate building for the accommodation 

 of the bookbinders has been commenced to the north of the 

 main building on a spare plot of ground acquired with the 

 British Museum Improvement property in 1895. An inde- 

 pendent range of workshops is also being erected on the 

 western side of the Museum. These buildings will set free 

 for storage a large part of the basement of the Museum 

 hitherto occupied by bookbinders and other workmen. 



Excavations in Cyprus were resumed in November on 

 Mycenaean sites at Maroni between Larnaca and Limassol, 

 and, more recently, near the Tekkc or sacred tomb at Larnaca. 

 They are still in progress, the results having been fairly 

 successful. 



