320 



MUSEUMS. 



Amidst all these extraordinary movements and 

 inventions, our museums alone seem to have stood 

 stock still, with the most invincible pertinacity. I 

 allude not to the m^re buildings themselves : they, 

 indeed, are ever on the change. Scarcely a year 

 passes over our heads, but some new structure is 

 raised by the votaries of natural history, with an 

 outside of beautiful architecture, but with inner 

 apartments destined to receive articles of old and 

 execrable workmanship. 



When I visit these magnificent buildings, in the 

 different countries through which I pass, I can 

 scarcely refrain from quoting the old verses : — 



" The walls are thick, the servants thin, 

 The gods without, the devils within." 



In every apartment dedicated to the arts and 

 sciences, saving that of natural history, we find the 

 materials in the inner places quite upon a par, and 

 often vastly superior, to the outer workmanship of 

 the building itself. Thus, he who dedicates a gallery 

 to painting always takes care to have a show of 

 pictures which will adorn the walls; and he who 

 builds an ornamental library seldom fails to fill it 

 with books far more costly and important than any 

 thing in the composition of the structure which he 

 has raised for their reception. But, when a com- 

 mittee of gentlemen is chosen to form a museum, 

 their attention to the outer parts of the building 

 seems to know no bounds ; whilst the ornamenting 

 of the interior (which, by the way, ought to be con- 

 sidered as the very marrrow and essence of the 



