SCREENS AND ELECTRIC LIFTS 327 



portion of our national collections so that the pictures 

 could be properly cared for and yet readily brought 

 into view when required. One can well believe that 

 a similar difficulty was anticipated when it was first 

 proposed to keep books on shelves instead of on tables. 

 Those who take this objection have overlooked the 

 resoiAces of modern engineering. Reserved pictures 

 could be affixed in perfect security in appropriate groups 

 on large screens, and these disposed, like the scenery 

 above a stage, upright and in series, each screen 4 ft. 

 distant from its neighbours. There could be three or 

 four floors of such closely packed screens arranged in two 

 rows, twenty in a row. On a lower floor there would be 

 provided a room with the most perfect light possible for 

 seeing, enjoying and studying a single one of these screens. 

 They would all be numbered and the pictures on each 

 catalogued. A person duly authorised and approved 

 desires to see such and such a picture. He is given a 

 seat in the special exhibition room. The attendant or 

 assistant in charge touches the appropriate button, and by 

 simple electric-lift machinery the screen upstairs carrying 

 the desired picture travels automatically into position and 

 then gently descends into the special exhibition room. 

 There the other pictures on the screen may be, if it be so 

 desired, covered by drapery, the light may be varied in 

 intensity or direction, and, in fact, the most perfect 

 examination of the picture in question may be made. 

 When another button is touched, the picture-screen 

 returns automatically to its place upstairs. 



It seems to me that in the case of the growing collec- 

 tion of pictures known as " The National Portrait 

 Gallery," this treatment would not only avoid the 

 necessity of constantly providing new galleries for new 

 acquisitions — but would enable the Trustees to separate 

 those portraits, which are of more general interest and 



