10 



kept in a condition fit for examination in any other way. A 

 large part of the collection of Radiates is likewise useless for 

 any nice systematic work. The expense and care required for 

 the maintenance of a large collection of Insects is well known; 

 the incessant care of Dr. Hagen and his Assistant has alone 

 kept ours from going to ruin, as so many other entomological 

 collections have done, from their mere size. But its increase 

 involves now an expenditure the Museum can ill afford. Of 

 course, with ample funds and a large number of aids, there is 

 no limit to the growth of an entomological department. Our 

 ornithological collection and that of mammal skins can be kept 

 within a reasonable expenditure from the method of storage 

 adopted. The osteological collection, also, when once properly 

 prepared, need not be a constant source of expense. The cost 

 of maintaining such a collection as is now stored in the Museum 

 has been for the past eight years at the rate of $24,000 a year, 

 of which nearly $18,000 is for salaries. This is merely for the 

 care and maintenance of the collection, and does not include 

 the cost of placing any part of it on exhibition, or the cost of 

 keeping those rooms open to the public. 



For these reasons I have gone somewhat into detail to point 

 out what seems to me to be the true policy of the institution 

 for the future, — to reduce its expenditures and staff to the 

 strict minimum compatible with the care of collections, and to 

 expend its resources in supplying the material, books, and speci- 

 mens needed for original investigation by the Professors and 

 students of Natural History in the University, to whom the 

 Museum should furnish in addition, in part or in whole, the 

 means of publication in its Bulletins and Memoirs. While we 

 have no cause to regret the publications which have been issued 

 in connection with the Museum, yet they do not represent suffi- 

 ciently the original work done by the teaching staff of the 

 University and their students. In addition, it should grant 

 other specialists, properly qualified, all the facilities they may 

 desire for the study of the Museum collections, consistent with 

 their safety. 



That this prospective analysis is not out of place will appear 

 from the fact that, whenever the original plan of the Museum 

 building is carried out, it does not provide for more room than 

 is likely to be needed by the various laboratories of the special 



