10 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1890. 



importance. There are several collections of ores, minerals, building- 

 stones, and of objects rep resenting various arts and industries, which 

 are of very great value, since they furnish to the American manufac- 

 turer and designer information of inestimable importance. 



The increase in the national collections during the last eight years may 

 perhaps be best described by the statement that in 1882 the total num- 

 ber of specimens recorded in the Museum was about 183,000; while in 

 1890 the records indicated the possession of nearly 3,000,000 speci- 

 mens. It is proper to say in this connection that the actual increase 

 was not so great as shown by the records, since during this period a 

 large amount of material previously received had been brought under 

 control and placed on the books of the Museum. It should also be 

 borne in mind that the present Museum building was planned with 

 reference to the reception of the material in its custody at the time of 

 its construction. 



In the Armory building there are at the present time several hun- 

 dreds of boxes containing valuable material which has never been 

 unpacked, since there is no space available for the display of the speci- 

 mens. Many of the boxes contain collections which were brought to 

 the Museum through the medium of special acts of Congress. 



Independently of the collections obtained at expositions, a very large 

 amount of material has been received from foreign Governments, among 

 which may be mentioned those of Mexico, Central America, several of 

 the South American states, and Japan, which have made extensive con- 

 tributions to the zoological, geological, ethnological, and technological 

 collections. 



APPRECIATION BY FOREIGN NATIONS. 



The new methods of work and of museum arrangement, which have 

 grown up here, have attracted much attention abroad. Mexico, in 

 1887, sent the entire collections of the National Natural History Mu- 

 seums, then just being founded, to Washington, in charge of two of her 

 principal naturalists, who passed six months at the National Museum 

 identifying their material and studying the methods of administration. 

 Costa Rica, forming a national museum, sent its director here for a six 

 months' course of study. 



Japan has sent the entire national collection of birds to the Museum 

 to be studied and reported upon by one of the naturalists of the Museum 

 staff. 



Germany has been supplied with a complete set of plans and illustra- 

 tions of methods of administration at the request of the Director of the 

 National Zoological Museum. 



In 1883, at the Fisheries Exhibition in London, the methods of the 

 National Museum were strictly adhered to in the arrangement of the 

 display made by the United States. 



In 1888, in his address as president of the Anthropological Society 

 of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, General 



