IRature IRotes : 
Zbe Selbovne Society’s fftaoastnc. 
No. 21. SEPTEMBER 15, 1891. Vol. IL 
HOME MUSEUMS. 
Nature Notes for last March (Vol. ii. p. 45) I gave 
a short account of my private museum, dwelling 
almost entirely on the zoological specimens contained 
in it. As the result of that article I received a num- 
ber of letters asking for further information, and showing so 
much interest in the subject and so much anxiety to carry my 
hints into practice, that I have determined to write some 
further notes as to the botanical and mineralogical portions of 
my collection, and to give some simple suggestions which will 
enable those who are anxious to do so to construct museums of 
their own. They will find it a much easier and more inexpen- 
sive matter than they might suppose, and the work of gathering 
treasures will prove just as pleasant as it is instructive. 
Real students and lovers of nature — indeed, any of us who 
find it a duty as well as a pleasure to learn as much as is 
possible of the mystery and beauty of the Divine Wisdom 
revealed to us therein — will never be satisfied with mere book 
knowledge of the wonderful world in which we have been 
placed. The dweller in the country lives all day in a vast 
storehouse in which the Creator shows us His works, which we 
roughly divide into animal, vegetable, and mineral kingdoms, 
each in its natural relation to the others, each helping in the 
formation and support of the others. There is never any pos- 
sibility that a dried and stuffed and ticketed collection, no 
matter how extensive, can give us teaching like this. But too 
often those who have most opportunities of wandering in the 
vast divinely-constructed museum of nature heed it the least. 
It has often given me the greatest pleasure to see in the many 
thousands of Londoners I have welcomed here, such a keen 
appreciation of the “common things” of the country. The 
woods, the gardens, the lake gave them innumerable objects for 
wonder and admiration, just as new to them as the curious pets 
