SECTION OF GRAPHIC ARTS. 157 



It is my duty also to call attention to the fact that a logical and 

 systematic development of this section must remain an impossibility 

 until the appropriation for purchases can be measurably increased. 

 During the period embraced by this report there were expended for 

 purchases for the Section of Graphic Arts about $175. The number 

 of accessions and the condition of tbe collections in general demon- 

 strate, indeed, that artists and publishers and other friends of the 

 Museum are ever ready to aid it. But such aid can hardly be regulated, 

 and can but rarely be turned into the most desirable channels. There 

 are many things needed which can only be bought, and others which 

 must be ordered with a definite view to the relation which they are to 

 bear to other things, if they are thoroughly to fill their places. These 

 limitations, as a matter of cmrse, can not be enforced so long as de- 

 pendence must be placed almost wholly upon gifts. 



