1856-81 
SCHEME FOR MUSEUM 
29 
allotted to the collections. The convenience of 
the arrangements he had been enabled to make 
in Lincoln s Inn Fields strongly forced upon his 
notice the chaos at the British Museum, and even 
as early as the year 1846 hd addressed a letter 
(''Ol- i- p- 276) to Lord Francis Egerton, in which 
we ^ may see the commencement of the scheme 
which began to near completion in 1881. 
Others besides Owen had fully recognised the 
gravity of the situation at the British Museum, 
for in 1854 John Edward Gray, the keeper of 
Zoology, had reported on the unfitness of damp 
vaults for the storage of zoological material, and 
prayed for additional accommodation. The appeal 
was referred by the Trustees to the architect, and 
on receiving the latter’s report, they ‘ declined to 
adopt Dr. Gray’s suggestion,’ and recommended 
that steps should be taken to obviate the deteriora- 
tion of the specimens ’ by treatment of the vaults 
in which they were stored. In the renewed 
appeals of Dr. Gray, the Trustees apparently set 
aside the architect as specialist on natural history, 
and recommended the erection of ‘an additional 
gallery to the eastern Zoological Gallery, and the 
substitution of skylights for the side windows, 
with a view to a further gallery at an elevation 
above the floor of the one in use.’ 
Professor Owen entered the service of the 
Trustees of the British Museum on May 26, 1856. 
already stated, he had been offered and 
