1XV1 PROCEEDINGS OP THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. [May 1895, 



When our Society first entered upon its mission, in 1807, but 

 few Museums existed anywhere, and Museums of Geology were 

 practically unknown. This Society must for very many years have 

 occupied a unique position as a centre for the diffusion of the know- 

 ledge of Geology and as a place wherein to test the new views of 

 Mr. William Smith, the geological land-surveyor, that strata could 

 he identified by organized fossils. 



Now all is changed : the British Museum is no longer merely a 

 receptacle for curiosities, but is one of the finest and most famous 

 collections in the world. I said one of the finest, but I need hardly 

 mention the fact here that the Old Museum has undergone sub- 

 division, and its Natural History Section, now separated from the 

 original Institution, almost rivals it in extent, so that, like the 

 ' Heavenly Twins,' they cast a double radiance from Bloomsbury 

 and Cromwell Road. 



Then, again, there is the Museum of Practical Geology in 

 Jermyn Street, which possesses an unrivalled collection of British 

 Fossils and would be far more widely known and visited than it is, 

 but for the fact that the architect put its front door in Jermyn 

 Street instead of in Piccadilly, the result being that benighted 

 visitors often fail to find their way in to this very interesting 

 Museum. 



In 1874 we moved our geological collections, so rich in figured 

 tvpe-specimens, with our other lares and penates, from Somerset 

 House to Burlington House. We have preserved them in some 

 order, and have even spent some money upon them ; but we need a 

 Curator whose time should be entirely devoted to the task of cleaning, 

 arranging, labelling, and conserving these historical specimens. If 

 we cannot afford to do this very obvious duty by the records of 

 the work of past geologists, of which we are the custodians and 

 our Museum the receptacle, it is obvious that we should, at no 

 distant day, decide to place them in some public Museum, such as 

 the British Museum of Natural History or the Museum of Practical 

 Geology, where they would be duly cared for at the national expense. 

 As a corollary of the foregoing subject of the Society's Museum 

 comes the question of the Society's Library. We find that just in 

 proportion as the need for the Museum has decreased, the demands 

 upon the Library have increased. Whilst the Library has always 

 required the entire services of an Assistant-Librarian, and has laid 

 claim upon a share of the Clerk's time and upon that even of the 

 Assistant-Secretary also, the Museum only enjoyed the services of 



