The Crisis at the British Museum . 
[December, 
yx6 
IV. THE CRISIS AT THE BRITISH MUSEUM. 
By R. M. N. 
E EW naturalists, 1 apprehend, can now traverse Great 
Russell Street without a sigh and the exclamation 
u Fuimus TroesF For them the British Museum is 
in one sense a thing merely of the past. Perhaps now the 
revolution has been consummated, and now there is little 
hope of its reversal in the lifetime of this generation, I may 
be permitted to attempt a brief and impartial survey of what 
the public has gained or lost by the recent changes. 
Every reader of the “ Journal of Science ” will doubtless 
know that the British Museum has been, from its very out- 
set, of a heterogeneous nature. Though under the control 
of one and the same governing body, it consisted in reality 
of three distinct institutions, very unequally yoked together, 
and not too amicable among each other. There is, first, the 
great National Library; secondly, the Collections of Anti- 
quities and Works of Ancient Art ; and lastly, though in my 
opinion of infinitely highest importance, the Natural-History 
Collections. 
Between these three departments there has always been 
a rivalry for working funds, and latterly for room. In both 
these respeCls the Natural-History Department generally 
came off worst. Scientific men have often had to feel dis- 
gusted at seeing money lavished on ancient manuscripts 
whilst important palaeontological specimens were secured by 
private collectors or by rival establishments abroad. On 
this point I need, however, say the less, as I am not aware 
that the recent changes extend to the appropriation of 
funds. 
There remains the great question of space. The growing 
extent of all the collections demanded more room than could 
possibly be provided in Great Russell Street. One of the 
departments must therefore be removed, and unfortunately, 
and as I hold most injudiciously, the lot of banishment fell 
upon the Natural-History Department. The removal of the 
Library, indeed, to some remote suburb would have been 
nothing short of a national calamity, and I can only hope 
that such a step may never be seriously proposed ; but the 
transportation of the Antiquarian Department to South 
Kensington would have been more rational than that of the 
