11 INTRODUCTION. 



portions of the great life-history of our globe — essential links in 

 the chain of Zoological series — instead of mere " medals" for the 

 identification of strata. Some of the greatest questions as to the 

 past condition of the earth are to be answered only by the study 

 of fossil in connection with living forms. 



But a Paheontological cabinet, in order to serve its end, must 

 possess a certain completeness. To illustrate certain forms of pri- 

 meval life in undue proportion, accumulating species under some 

 few genera and leaving whole families, orders, and even classes of 

 the fossil Zoological series entirely unrepresented, is to distort 

 nature. This sort of exclusiveness is an unavoidable feature in 

 the drawers of a Palaeontologist who is working on a special fauna 

 or some particular zoological division of fossils. But to accomplish 

 the purposes of general instruction, a cabinet of fossils should be 

 as complete as possible, covering the whole ground, and giving an 

 unbroken view of ancient life. What our Colleges must have as 

 the primary condition of their success in the Natural Sciences, — 

 and yet that which, it must be said, they almost universally lack, 

 — is a consistent and well-proportioned exhibition of all the classes 

 in the several departments of nature. 



There are many difficulties in the way of attaining this com- 

 pleteness in a Museum of Palaeontology. One of these arises from 

 the fact that such collections are usually the fruit of explorations 

 in a limited area, and show only the forms belonging to a single 

 geological period and a single zoological province. Such a collection 

 is of great value if earnestly and thoroughly studied in connection 

 with the strata which furnished it, but it is utterly insufficient to 

 give a correct idea of the broad features of ancient animal life 

 at various times and over the entire globe. The Corals, Crinoids, 

 Brachiopods and Trilobites, which unduly preponderate in cabinets 

 made in the Palaeozoic areas of our Northern, Middle and West- 

 ern States, should be rounded out and symmetrized by suitable 

 additions of higher and different forms from the Mesozoic and Ter- 

 tiary rocks of other parts of the world. 



With methodic, intelligent effort, and a judicious expenditure of 

 funds, this difficulty may be met and the desired variety obtained. But 

 our Museum still has a defect which it is impossible to overcome other 

 than in one way. Unless the funds to invest have been princely, 

 and the facilities for securing choice material very great and ex- 

 tended over a long period of years, we shall find that our specimens 

 show but trivial portions of the larger and, in some sense, more 

 interesting and important forms. Our Mastodon and Mammoth will 



