130 STUDY COLLECTIONS 
largely in exchange, to museums and libraries throughout the world. 
The popular publications include the Journal, Leaflets, Guides and 
Handbooks, and are intended for the information of the general public. 
The Journal, begun in 1900, is the means of promptly informing the 
Museum members of the work of the institution, giving the results of the 
many expeditions, telling of the collections made, or more important 
informations gathered. It also describes at length interesting or note- 
worthy installations, and notes the accessions to the various depart- 
ments, changes in the personnel of the Museum, and elections to Mem- 
bership. The Illustrated Guide Leaflets deal with exhibits of particular 
interest or importance, such as the Habitat Group of Birds, the Evolu- 
tion of the Horse, Meteorites, the Indians of Manhattan, calling atten- 
tion to important objects on exhibition and giving information in regard 
to them. The Handbooks, five of which have been issued, deal with 
subjects or topics rather than objects. Thus the Plains Indians Hand- 
book, by Dr. Wissler, is not merely a guide to the exhibition hall, but 
tells of the life and customs of these Indians, their language, political 
organization, religious beliefs and ceremonies. 
The distribution of these popular publications is a part of the educa- 
tional work of the Museum, as are exhibits and lectures, and so far 
they have been necessarily sold below the cost of publication, as is done 
by other Museums. (See list at end of this Guide.) 
An important part of the Museum, not seen by the public, is the 
workshops, located in the basement and provided with 
machinery of the most improved pattern. Here, among 
other things, are constructed the various types of cases used in the 
Museum, including the light, metal-frame case, devised in the institution. 
Still other rooms, which, of necessity, are not open to the public, are 
the laboratories, wherein is carried on the varied work of preparing 
exhibits, work which calls for the services of a very considerable number 
of artists and artisans. 
Here are cast, modeled, or mounted the figures for the many groups 
from Man to Myxine, here leaves are made to grow and flowers to bloom 
as accessories for beasts,* birds and fishes, to say nothing of reptiles and 
amphibians, and here, with painstaking care, are slowly created in glass 
and wax the magnified copies of invertebrates. 
From all this may be gathered that a museum is a very busy place, 
much more so than the casual visitor is apt to imagine. In fact, a very 
good museum man has said that a museum is much like an iceberg, seven- 
eighths of it under water and invisible. 
*See Guide Leaflet No. 34. 
Workshops 
