PROCEEDINGS—PERTHSHIRE SOCIETY OF NATURAL SCIENCE. 
V 
been spared to make both the building and the cases as suitable as 
possible to the purpose for which they are intended. As a result 
the rooms are large, airy, and well lighted, with abundant passage 
room between the cases. There are no galleries, all the rooms being 
lighted by large side lights, and, as the interior is painted white 
throughout, the specimens have the best possible justice done them 
as regards light, which is a most important element in successful 
museum display. The cases are very handsome in appearance, 
being of mahogany and plate-glass, and of large size. The Museum 
is not on a very extensive scale as yet, but it has ample ground, and 
also, apparently, ample means, to extend. Both here and in Phila¬ 
delphia the local authorities appear to take a very liberal view of 
their duty towards educational institutions of this kind. One attrac¬ 
tive and instructive feature in both the Washington and New York 
Museums was a number of coloured photographic transparencies, on 
ground glass, about 12 by 18 inches, representing geological and 
other features of the country, which were hung on the windows. Of 
the Curators of the New York Museum, I have to express my special 
indebtedness to Professor R. P. Whitfield, at the head of the Palaeon¬ 
tological and Conchological Departments. 
I had hoped also to visit the Natural History Museum at Yale 
University, but, unfortunately, this was not possible in the limited 
time at my disposal. 
Besides the few stray facts stated in the foregoing report, I have 
taken some notes regarding measurements of cases, etc., which will 
be at the service of the Committee if required. 
I think I cannot conclude more fitly than by quoting the follow T - 
ing most pregnant sentences from Professor Brown Goode’s “ Report 
of the National Museum, Washington, 1889-90,” to which my atten¬ 
tion was drawn by Mr. Thomas Wilson :—“ The general character of a 
museum should be clearly determined at its very inception. Special¬ 
isation and division of labour are essential for institutions as well as 
for individuals, and it is equally necessary to decide which lines of 
development are to be favoured in preference to all others. Many 
museums fail to make this choice at the start, and, instead of steering 
towards some definite point, drift hither and thither, and, it may be, 
are foundered in mid-ocean.” 
Dr. Buchanan White read the following notes on the Summer 
Excursions of 1893 : — 
As has been the habit of the Society for many years, the first 
excursion of the season took place on the day set apart for the local 
celebration of the Queen’s Birthday, namely, the 25th of May. On 
most, if not all, previous occasions the botanists regarded this 
excursion as affording an opportunity for a pleasant walk rather than 
as a day of actual work, and brought their vasculums more from 
custom than with an expectation of filling them with specimens. 
Phis is due, of course, to the fact that many plants do not come 
into bloom before Tune. May, 1893, has, however, proved a notable 
exception to the rule, and, though all the species about to be men- 
