
1890.] Editorial. 159 
written law forbidding it, so that had this institution been content 
to remain a private one, it might have pursued its course for many 
years. But the reputation obtained in the manner above described, 
proved too impressive to be passed without special recognition. 
Between ignorance of the facts and pachydermatous consciences, 
the proprietor of the establishment which turned out such results 
was made president of the United States National Academy of 
Sciences. It became evident also that so worthy an adjunct in 
the advancement of science should have the recognition and 
financial aid of the United States. So the trader in brains be- 
came the paleontologist of the United States Geological Survey. 
Both of these appointments do no credit to those who effected 
them. In the latter case the responsibility rests on a single man, 
the director of the Survey. The spectacle thus presented by two 
of the three leading scientific organizations of the United States 
Government, is one which should make every American blush. 
Some work of the same kind as that produced by this establish- 
ment had been ordered by a previous congress, and the execution of 
it had been placed in the hands of the Geological Survey by the 
Secretary of the Interior. For eight years the Director of the 
Geological Survey has failed to carry out the orders of the 
Secretary, and the concurrent resolutions of Congress. To do 
so would be to anticipate some of the work of the new organ- 
ization which had been adopted by the Survey. The man who 
hired others to do this work could not tolerate another man who 
did his own work so “ near the throne.” Besides, he could not do 
the work without the specimens used by his predecessor, the other 
man, and so he must get possession of them, although they are 
the private property of the latter. The materials on which the 
work ordered by Congress and the Secretary were to be based 
must be presented to the Government, and then the question of 
publishing the work would be considered! It is Naboth’s Vine- 
yard with two Ahabs. The modern Naboth, however, lived in the 
land of newspapers and of public opinion, and these have been 
heard from. Ahab has not yet obtained the vineyard. 
—TuE numbers of the NATURALIST for 1889 were issued (by 
the grace of the Leonard Scott Publication Co.) at the following 
