GROUND FLOOR. 
39 
men, who for forty-one years presided over the Eoyal Society, and 
was an active Trustee of the Museum. His splendid botanical 
collections are preserved in the adjoining gallery, but his 
unrivalled library of works on natural history, also bequeathed to 
the Museum, remains in the old building at Bloomsbury, in the 
entrance hall of which the statue, erected by public subscription 
in 1826, stood, until it was removed to its present situation by 
direction of the Trustees in the year 1886. 
The west corridor contains a portion of the series of British 
birds with their nests (see p. 40), for which there is not room 
in the Bird Gallery on the ground floor. The specimens 
placed here belong to the smaller kinds, being mostly of the 
Perching or Passerine order. 
In the east corridor is placed at present the collection of Gould _ 
Humming-birds (Trochilidce) arranged and mounted by the late humming- 0 * 
Mr. John Gould, and purchased for the Museum after his death Birds, 
in 1881. The resplendent colours and singular varieties of form 
presented by these fairy-like objects must always excite feelings 
of admiration and wonder in all who gaze upon them. 
WEST WING. 
The whole of the west wing of the building is devoted to the 
collections of recent Zoology. 
(A) Ground Floor. 
The ground floor is entered from the west side (left hand) of Mrd Gallery, 
the Central Hall, near the main entrance of the building. The 
long gallery extending the entire length of the front of the 
wing is assigned to the exhibited collection of birds, the study 
series of the same group being kept in cabinets in a room 
behind. 
The wall-cases contain mounted specimens of all the principal Systematic 
species arranged in systematic order, beginning with the Vultures, wall-cases, 
on the left hand on entering, and ending with the Penguins on 
the right. The arrangement adopted is that of the Catalogue, 
now in course of publication. 
From the multitude of specimens which are exhibited in this 
