1876.] The Origin and Development of Museums. 135 
of a dull bluish-white color, and slightly spotted with faint brown 
blotches. One of the eggs in my collection is of a dusky white 
color, slightly tinged with dull blue, with oblong blotches of 
greenish-blue, and quite granulated. The measurements of two 
taken from different localities are as follows: long diameter 2,3, 
inches, short diameter 14°; the second one, 24 inches by 14 
inches. These measurements are somewhat less, and the egg was 
less spherical, than the one described by Dr. Brewer in his North 
American Odlogy. After thirty years’ observation and experience 
in ornithological and odlogical researches, I am satisfied that it is 
not wise to place too much reliance upon the measurements or 
number of eggs found in anest. This is particularly the case with 
our rapacious birds. Take for instance the great horned owl. 
Audubon says that it lays from three to six eggs; another collector 
says it always lays two eggs. While this may seem inexplicable 
to some, it admits of a very easy solution. A pair of these birds 
will occupy the same piece of woods for years if not molested, 
and the collector who finds their nest will invariably find two 
eggs. Ihave found two, three, four, and five eggs in a nest of 
this bird in different localities. The old bird lays two eggs, 
while the younger bird lays the larger number and the smallest 
eggs. I have never seen these facts in print, and am not aware 
that. they are known to odlogists, but they are based upon my 
Observations and that of my collectors. They explain many 
seeming discrepancies, and for this reason I have digressed some- 
what from my subject in order to give what I consider impor- 
tant facts to the odlogist, as this closes my series of articles on the 
game falcons of New England. 
THE ORIGIN AND DEVELOPMENT OF MUSEUMS.’ 
BY DR. H. A. HAGEN. 
[THE second part of the seventeenth century is remarkable for 
the formation of academies in nearly every great city, and 
Some, principally in Italy, were founded even a century before. 
The first one, the Academia Secretorum Nature, founded in 1560 
in Rome, was soon suppressed by the popes as being dangerous. 
Of those founded in the seventeenth century, some were more 
Successful, and the most prominent are still vigorous, as, for in- 
stance, the Royal Society in London, the Leopoldine Academy in 
; 1 Concluded from page 89. 
