INTRODUCTION. 
9 
Three fundamental alterations in the constitution of the 
Board of Trustees were introduced by the Statute of 1910 
and deserve special mention. In the first place, the officer in 
charge of each section of the Museum became a Trustee ex- 
officio, and was thus placed in a position to take part in the 
deliberations of the Trustees. In the second place, three 
members were allowed to be elected by Public Bodies, viz. 
one by the University of Calcutta, one by the Bengal 
Chamber of Commerce and one by the British Indian Associa¬ 
tion. In the third place, the number of representatives of 
the Asiatic Society, which by the Statute of 1866 was fixed 
at four and was raised to five in the Statutes of 1876 and 
1887, was reduced to one. The effect of the changes thus 
recently introduced will, it is confidently expected, secure 
the more effective and harmonious administration of the 
Institution in the future. 
I shall now pass on to a brief review of the development 
of the Museum since 1875, when the collections of the Asiatic 
Society were transferred to our new buildings. As already 
explained, the Museum, at the time, consisted, in the main, 
of the zoological, geological and archaeological collections. 
In June, 1882 the Government of India enquired from the 
Trustees whether accommodation could be provided in the 
Museum building for certain Economic products. The Trus¬ 
tees regretted their inability to accommodate such a collec¬ 
tion, but expressed their readiness to favour an extension of 
the Museum building for the purpose suggested. Before 
effect could be given to this proposal, the Great Exhibition 
of 1883 was held in Calcutta. In 1884, after the Exhibition 
had been closed, it was suggested that the industrial collec¬ 
tions, which had been brought to the Museum for the 
Exhibition, and under the designation of the Bengal Economic 
Museum, had been housed in temporary sheds on the site now 
occupied by the School of Art, might appropriately be amal¬ 
gamated with the Indian Museum. The times were favour¬ 
able for the acceptance of this scheme, which was rapidly 
advanced, and on the 1st April, 1887 the Economic and Art 
Section, which had formed a separate Institution under the 
