Chap. I. tionary' (Died 18 December, 1771); with portions of BooK 1, the Collections of Tournefort, Hermann, and INTRODUC Loureiro. (XXXI) 1829. The HARTZ-MOUNTAINS MINERALS. Collected at various periods and by several mineralogists. This fine Cabinet was for a considerable period preserved Presented by King George the at Richmond. Fourth. TION. (XXXII) 1829. The EGERTON MANUSCRIPTS. Collected by Francis Henry Egerton, Earl of Bridgewater (Died 11 February, 1829). Bequeathed by the Collector; together with a sum of £12,000, to be invested, and the yearly income to be applied for further purchases of MSS. from time to time; and with other provision towards the salary of an Egerton Librarian.' [See Book II, Chapter 5.] (XXXIII) 1831. The ARUNDELIAN MANUSCRIPTS. Collected, between the years 1606 and 1646, by Thomas Howard, Earl of Arundel, &c. (Died 4 Oct., 1646); Given in 1681 by his eventual heir, Henry Howard, Esquire (afterwards XIIth Duke of Norfolk -Died in 1701), and at the request of John Evelyn, to the Royal Society; Transferred by the Council of that Society, in 1831,-partly by purchase, and partly by exchange to the Trustees of the British Museum. The Collection includes the bulk of the Library of Bilibald Pirckheimer, purchased at Nuremberg, by LORD ARUNDEL, in 1636. [See Book I, Chapter 4.] SOPIONS OF PICTURES BELONGING TO SRUSTEES OF THE BRITISH MUSEUM, *PPOSITED IN THE NATIONAL GAL Srdourge Howland Beaumont Tiven by the Collector in 1823 condition of its usufructuary milie. Deposited in the National a chuo of dirangement, after the Collector's Trudy lettosan-Collections that came LOC Allods te ist seventy years which wola gpedig January, 1759). They eiberality and public Cyrodiden, sit of the fidelity of the ye to them as a body. tave alled to notice how nos munificent of the Benefactors of the institution were, previously to their gifts, Book I, numbered amongst its Trustees. If the liberality of Parliament failed to be elicited in due correspondency-in respect either to the amount or the frequency of its grants-to that of individuals, the failure is rarely, if ever, ascribable to oversight or somnolency on the part of the Trustees. If, during the lapse of those seventy years, they obtained grants of public money which amounted, in the aggregate, to but £151,762-little more, on an average, than two thousand pounds a year-they made not a few applications to which the Treasury, or the House of Commons, refused to respond. Meanwhile, the gifts of Benefactors probably much more than trebled the public grants. At the outset, the Museum was divided into three 'Departments' only: (1) Manuscripts; (2) Printed Books ; (3) Natural History. The acquisition, in 1801, of the Alexandrian monuments, was the first accession which gave prominence to the 'Antiquities theretofore regarded as little more than a curious appendage to the Natural History Collections. Four years later came the Townley Marbles. It was then obvious that a new Department ought to be made. This change was effected in 1807. The Marbles and minor Antiquities, together with the Prints, Drawings, Coins, and Medals (formerly appended to the Departments of Printed Books and of MSS.) were formed into a separate department. Twenty years afterwards the Botanical Department' was created, on the reception of the Banksian herbaria and their appendant Collections. The division into five departments continued down to the date of the Parliamentary inquiry of 1835-36 [Book III, Chapter 1]. Soon afterwards (1837), the immediate custody of the 'Prints and Chap. I. TION. Book I, TION. Drawings' was severed from that of the 'Antiquities' and made a special charge. In like manner, the Department of Natural History' was also (1837) subdivided; but in this instance the one department became, eventually, three: (1) Zoology; (2) Palæontology; (3) Mineralogy. The two last-named divisions were first separated in 1857. How the eight departments of 1860 have become twelve in 1869 will be seen hereafter. It will also, I think, become apparent that this subdivision of Departments has contributed, in an important measure, to the enlargement of the several Collections; as well as to their better arrangement, and to other exigencies of the public service. We have now to enumerate the more salient and important among the many successive acquisitions of the last forty years. Taken collectively, they have so enlarged the proportions of the national repository as to make the British Museum' of 1831 seem, in the retrospect, as if, at that time, it had been yet in its infancy. In 1831 there were still living-here and there-a few ancient Londoners whose personal recollections extended over the whole period during which the Museum had existed. One or two of them could, perhaps, still call to mind something of the aspect which the gaily painted and decorated rooms of old Montagu House presented when-as children-they had been permitted to accompany some fortunate possessor of a ticket of admission to 'see the curiosities;' and were hurried by the Cerberus in charge for the day from room to room; the Cerberus aforesaid (unless his memory has been libelled) seeming to count the minutes, if a visitor chanced to show the least desire for a closer inspection of anything which caught his eye. And, in some points-although certainly not in that point-the Book 1, Museum of 1831 was not very greatly altered, much as it INTRODUChad been enlarged, from the Museum of 1759. Cerberus TION. had long quitted his post; but many portions of the Collections he had had in charge retained their wonted aspect, much as he had left them. Such octogenarian survivors-if endowed with a good memory-would see, in their latest visits to Great Russell Street much more to remind them of what they had seen in the first, than a new visitor of 1831 could now see,-in 1869,—were he, in his turn, striving to recall the impressions of his earliest visit. The period now to be briefly outlined-in order to a fair preliminary view of our subject-is marked, like that of 1759-1831, by continued munificence on the part of private donors; but it is also marked-unlike that—by some approach towards proportionate liberality from the keepers of the public purse; as well as by energetic and persistent efforts for internal improvement, on the part both of Trustees and of Officers. It forms a quite new epoch. It may be said, unexaggeratedly, to have witnessed a re-foundation of the Museum, in almost everything that bears on its direct utility to the public. In regard to this last period, however no less than in regard to the foregoing one-only the more salient Collections can here be enumerated. Many minor ones have been passed over already, notwithstanding their intrinsic value. Many others-equally meriting notice, were space for it available-will have, in like manner, to be passed over now. |