THE TECHNOLOGIST. [Oct. .1, 1864. 



106 OS MUSEUM ARRANGEMENT 



studying the specimens of which they consist. Now, it appears to me 

 that in the desire to combine these two objects, which are essentially 

 distinct, the first object — namely, the general instruction of the people, 

 has been to a great extent lost sight of, and sacrificed to the second, 

 without any corresponding advantage to the latter, because the system 

 itself has been thoroughly erroneous. The curators of large museums 

 have naturally, and, perhaps, properly, been men more deeply devoted 

 to scientific study than interested in elementary instruction, and they 

 have consequently done what they thought best for the promotion of 

 science by accommodating and exhibiting on the shelves or the open 

 cases of the museum every specimen that they possessed, without con- 

 sidering that by so doing they were overwhelming the general visitor 

 with a mass of unintelligible objects, and at the same time rendering 

 their attentive study by the man of science more difficult and onerous 

 than if they had been brought into a smaller space and in a more avail- 

 able condition. What the largest class of visitors — the general public — 

 want, is a collection of the more interesting objects so arranged as to 

 afford the greatest possible amount of information in a moderate space, 

 and to be obtained, as it were, at a glance. The student, on the other 

 hand (and though these are undoubtedly the most important, they 

 form but an infinitesimal proportion of the mass), the scientific student 

 requires to have under his eyes, and in his hands, the most complete 

 collection of specimens that can be brought together, and in such a con- 

 dition as to admit of the most minute examination of their differences, 

 whether of age, or sex, or state, or of whatever kind that can throw 

 light upon all the innumerable questions that are continually arising in 

 the progress of thought and opinion. In the futile attempt to combine 

 these two purposes in one consecutive arrangement, the modern museum 

 entirely fails in both particulars. It is only to be compared to a large 

 store, or a city warehouse, in which every specimen that can be collected 

 is arranged in its proper shelf, so that it may be found when wanted, 

 but the uninformed mind derives little instruction from the contemplation 

 of its stores, while the student of Nature requires a far more careful 

 examination of them than is possible under such a system. To consult 

 such an arrangement with any advantage, the visitor should be as well 

 informed with relation to the system on which it is based as the curator 

 himself, and consequently the general visitor perceives little else than a 

 chaos of specimens, of which the bulk of those placed in close proximity 

 are so nearly alike that he can scarcely perceive any difference between 

 them, even supposing them to be placed on a level with the eye, while 

 the greater number of those which are above or below the level are 

 utterly unintelligible. To such visitors the numerous specimens of rats 

 or squirrels, or sparrows or larks, that crowd the shelves, from all parts 

 of the world, are but a rat, a squirrel, a sparrow, or a lark ; and this is 

 still more especially the case with animals of a less marked and less 

 known types of character. Experience has long since convinced me that 



