4 
THE INDIAN MUSEUM: 1814-1914. 
by the Government of India. But the difficulties of com¬ 
munication in those days were so great that it was not 
till 1839 that the Government could obtain a reply from the 
Court of Directors in London. The Court sanctioned a grant 
of Rs. 300 a month for the salary of the curator and the 
maintenance of the Museum, and also authorized the Govern¬ 
ment of India to make grants from time to time for 
special purposes. Dr. McClelland, who had with great ability 
temporarily filled the office of curator, now resigned, and was 
succeeded by Mr. Edward Blyth, who had been selected by 
Dr. Horace Hayman Wilson in England. He proved himself 
ultimately to be an even more distinguished ichthyologist and 
naturalist than his predecessor. 
Edward Blyth took up his duties as curator in Septem¬ 
ber, 1841 and devoted himself to the duties of his new office 
with remarkable zeal; but as he was not a geologist, he found 
himself embarrassed in the management of the geological 
collections, which, at the time, were second in importance 
only to the archaeological collections of the Society. The 
difficulty of the situation was, however, successfully met by 
reason of the timely action which had already been taken by 
the Government of India. In 1835, the Government of 
India, encouraged by the satisfactory working of the coal¬ 
mines at Raneegunj and anxious to develop the mineral 
resources of the country (to which attention had been drawn 
by Dr. Heifer and other scientific officers), had decided 
to found a Museum of Economic Geology in Calcutta. This 
Museum was actually opened in 1840. 
Shortly afterwards, in May 1841, Captain G. B. Tremen- 
heere, who had been sent to England to secure a nucleus of a 
Museum of Economic Geology, returned to Calcutta with a 
large and valuable collection of specimens. These were 
deposited in the Society’s rooms, and the Government of 
India sanctioned an additional grant of Rs. 250 a month for 
a separate curator. Mr. Piddington was appointed curator of 
the Geological collection inclusive of the specimens which 
were the property of the Society and which Mr. Edward 
Blyth had found it difficult to arrange. The Museum of 
Economic Geology thus constituted continued to occupy the 
