EECAPITTJLATION OF GENERAL PRINCIPLES. 343 



whale, a marsupial, a bird, a reptile, or a fisli.* It is needless to 

 say — taking into consideration tlie fact that these are pre- 

 pared under the direction of the curator, Mr. Moore, and his 

 accomplished family — that all are beautifully arranged and 

 classified. In short, Liverpool is to be congratulated on its 

 collections of bones and invertebrates. Turning, however, to 

 the vertebrates, we see that, although the management begins 

 to recognise the importance of "pictorial" mounting, it is done 

 in a half-hearted manner — isolated groups here and there, on 

 square boards, placed in the general collection amongst the 

 birds, on pegs, serving only to render the latter more con- 

 spicuous in their shortcomings. This system of Liverpool is 

 being copied at ISTottingham, Derby, and other places, and was 

 being copied also at Leicester, but not being, to my mind, half 

 thorough enough, has been discarded for the more ambitious 

 — certainly more effective — and quite as scientific method of 

 arranging the vertebrates pictorially, and in their proper se- 

 quence in orders and families, endeavour being made to represent 

 specimens of each genus also, where practicable, in this manner. 

 As will be seen, in making a brief resume of what has gone 

 before, I am in favour of large, top-lighted rooms, painted 

 in a light neutral tint, well warmed; cases built in oak, with 

 single sheets of plate-glass not less than 7ft. 6in. by 5ft. or 8ft. by 

 5ft. 4in., artificially lighted by pendants shaded from the eye ; the 

 vertebrates to be pictorially mounted both in the " general " and 

 "local" collections, but, of course, zoological sequence and science 

 not to suffer in consequence ; I think that the " local " and 

 *' general" typical collections should be entirely distinct though 

 •close to each other in the same room for comparison ; that ex- 

 treme care should be taken in the collection and mounting of the 

 animals inhabiting the district, and that no opportunity be lost 

 of making this latter as complete as possible ; that anything for 

 which the locality is famed, be it fossils or antiquities, be the 

 •chief motif of any provincial museum ; that, failing this, some 

 groups or forms be collected to establish a monograph, such 

 as iN'orwich is doing with its Accipitres ; that, where practicable, 



* Of course, a]l this rnav be seen in the Musenm of the College of Surgeons, or at Oxford 

 or Cambridge, &c., but the~e are special institutions, and I am merely taking provincial 

 general museums as my standpoint. 



