Ch. X] 



CABINETS AND TRAYS FOR SPECIMENS 



341 



should be protected from injury. During the last few years several 

 forms of cabinets or slide holders have been devised. Some are very 

 cheap and convenient where one has but a few sHdes. For a laboratory 

 or for a private collection where 

 the shdes are numerous the follow- 

 ing characters seem to the writer 

 essential: 



(i) The cabinet should allow the 

 sUdes to he flat, and exclude dust 

 and hght. 



(2) Each sKde or pair of sUdes 

 should be in a separate compart- 

 ment. At each end of the compart- 

 ment should be a groove or bevel, 

 so that upon depressing either end 

 of the slide the other may be easily 

 grasped (fig. 204). It is also desir- 

 able to have the floor of the com- 

 partment grooved so that the shde 

 rests only on two edges, thus pre- 

 venting soihng the shde opposite 

 the object. 



(3) Each compartment or each 

 space sufficient to contain one shde 

 of the standard size should be num- 

 bered, preferably at each end. If 

 the compartments are made of suf- 

 ficient width to receive two sHdes, 

 then the double slides so frequently 

 used in mounting serial sections 

 may be put into the cabinet in any 

 place desired. 



(4) The drawers of the cabinet should be entirely independent, 

 so that any drawer may be partly or wholly removed without dis- 

 turbing any of the others. 



(5) On the front of each drawer should be the number of the drawer 



Fig. 204. Face and Edge View 

 OF A Cabinet Drawer for Micro- 

 scopic Slides. 



g6, yo The number of the com- 

 partment. 



at In the compartment a, the 

 slide is resting in place to show that 

 the container touches the slide only 

 in two places. 



In b, the slide is depressed into 

 the groove at one end of the com- 

 partment. It is then easy to grasp 

 the slide. 



