1871.] 211 [Annual Report 



labor of awakening a desire for knowledge in the minds of 

 the public, by the exposition of curious specimens, is ap- 

 proaching completion, and even the most ignorant are in 

 some measure prepared to respect any attempt to offer them 

 more solid, intellectual entertainment. The students of the 

 neighboring Institute of Technology and the teachers and 

 pupils of our public and private schools form another impor- 

 tant class to whom our collections are useful. These, as well 

 as the public, require such a classification of the specimens as 

 will convey a knowledge of general laws and principles unen- 

 cumbered by details. Careful pruning of the specimens on 

 exhibition, the concealment of all others in convenient depo- 

 sitories, and the strict limitation of the purchase of specimens 

 to typical forms, are the only means by which we may hope 

 to avoid the accumulation of unsuitable material. The Orni- 

 thological and New England collections must be necessarily 

 cumulative, but with correct management may be made 

 subservient to the illustration of general principles without 

 injury to their scientific value. When distributed in faunal 

 groups they can be used to demonstrate certain laws and 

 principles which cannot be explained by the more compre- 

 hensive zoological and anatomical portions of the Museum. 



These conclusions were thought by many of the most 

 experienced members of the Society, to afford a correct foun 

 dation, and in accordance with them a series of practical rules 

 was drawn up and provisionally adopted. With regard to 

 the Meetings, Publications and Library, these rules were 

 substantially the same as those principles which have just 

 been recommended, but in the Museum they were much more 

 minute. 



The governing principle proposed for this department was 

 that all the different collections should form together a con- 

 secutive series of lessons in the structure of the earth and in 

 the organization of animals and plants. To accomplish this, 

 only such specimens should be exhibited as would promi- 

 nently represent some definite step in the morphological or 



