is that the exhibits shall be properly shown. “The value of a
museum is to be tested by the treatment of its contents”
(Flower, p. 24). But in many museums the chief hindrance to
study and enjoyment is overcrowding of exhibits. Although
a truism, it is necessary to state that each object should be
properly seen, cleaned and safeguarded; but all over the world
this rule is forgotten. The rapid acquisition of objects is one
cause of overcrowding, but a faulty appreciation of the didactic
purpose of the collection is more frequently responsible.
In Great Britain, museum progress is satisfactory. Visitors are numbered by millions, access is now permitted on Sundays and week-days alike, and entrance fees are being consistently reduced; in this the contrast between Great Britain and some foreign countries is singular. A generation or so ago the national collections of Italy used to beGrowth and Progress. always open to the public. Pay-days, however, were gradually established, with the result that the chief collections are now only visible without payment on Sundays. In Dresden payment is obligatory five days a week. The British Museum never charges for admission. On the other hand, the increase in continental collections is more rapid than in Great Britain, where acquisitions are only made by gift, purchase or bequest. In other European countries enormous collections have been obtained by revolutions and conquest, by dynastic changes, and by secularizing religious foundations. Some of the chief treasures of provincial museums in France were spoils of the Napoleonic armies, though the great bulk of this loot was returned in 1815 to the original owners. In Italy the conversion of a monastery into a museum is a simple process, the Dominican house of San Marco in Florence offering a typical example. A further stimulus to the foundation of museums on the continent is the comparative ease with which old buildings are obtained and adapted for the collections. Thus the Germanisches Museum of Nuremberg is a secularized church and convent; the enormous collections belonging to the town of Ravenna are housed in an old Camaldulensian monastery. At Louvain and Florence municipal palaces of great beauty are used; at Nimes a famous Roman temple; at Urbino the grand ducal palace, and so on. There are, however, certain disadvantages in securing both building and collection ready-made, and the special care devoted to museums in Great Britain can be traced to the fact that their cost to the community is considerable. Immense sums have been spent on the buildings alone, nearly a million sterling being devoted to the new buildings for the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. Had it been possible to secure them without such an outlay the collections themselves would have been much increased, though in this increase itself there would have been a danger, prevalent but not yet fully realized in other countries, of crowding the vacant space with specimens of inferior quality. The result is that fine things are badly seen owing to the masses of second-rate examples; moreover, the ample space available induces the authorities to remove works of art from their original places, in order to add them to the museums. Thus the statue of St George by Donatello has been taken from the church of Or San Michele at Florence (on the plea of danger from exposure), and is now placed in a museum where, being dwarfed and under cover, its chief artistic value is lost. The desire to make financial profit from works of art is a direct cause of the modern museum movement in Italy. One result is to displace and thus depreciate many works of art, beautiful in their original places, but quite insignificant when put into a museum. Another result is that, owing to high entrance fees, the humbler class of Italians can rarely see the art treasures of their own country. There are other collections, akin to art museums, which would best be called biographical museums. They illustrate the life and Work of great artists or authors. Of these the most notable are the museums commemorating Dürer at Nuremberg, Beethoven at Bonn, Thorwaldsen at Copenhagen, Shakespeare at Stratford and Michelangelo at Florence. The sacristies of cathedrals often contain ecclesiastical objects of great value, and are shown to the public as museums. Cologne, Aachen, Milan, Monza and Reims have famous treasuries. Many Italian cathedrals have small museums attached to them, usually known as “Opera del Duomo.”
United Kingdom.—The influence and reputation of the British Museum are so great that its original purpose, as stated in the preamble of the act by which it was founded (1753, c. 22), may be quoted: “Whereas all arts and sciences have a connexion with each other, and discoveries in natural philosophy and other branches of speculative knowledge,British Museum. for the advancement and improvement whereof the said museum or collection was intended, do, or may in many instances give help and success to the most useful experiments and undertakings . . .” The “said museum” above mentioned referred to the collection of Sir Hans Sloane, to be purchased under the act just quoted. Sir Hans Sloane is therein stated, “through the course of many years, with great labour and expense, to have gathered together whatever could be procured, either in our own or foreign countries, that was rare and curious.” In order to buy his collections and found the museum a lottery of £300,000 was authorized, divided into 50,000 tickets, the prizes varying from £10 to £10,000. Provision was made for the adequate housing of Sir Robert Cotton’s books, already bought in 1700 (12 and 13 Will. III. c. 7). This act secured for the nation the famous Cottonian manuscripts, “of great use and service for the knowledge and preservation of our constitution, both in church and state.” Sir Robert’s grandson had preserved the collection with great care, and was willing that it should not be “disposed of or embeziled,” and that it should be preserved for public use and advantage. This act also sets forth the oath to be sworn by the keeper, and deals with the appointment of trustees. This is still the method of internal government at the British Museum, and additions to the Board of Trustees are made by statute, as in 1824, in acknowledgment of a bequest. The trustees are of three classes: (𝑎) three principal trustees, namely the Primate, the Lord Chancellor and the Speaker; (𝑏) general trustees, entitled ex officio to the position in virtue of ministerial office; (𝑐) family, bequest and nominated trustees. A standing committee of the trustees meets regularly at the museum for the transaction of business. The great departments of the museum (apart from the scientific and zoological collections, now placed in the museum in Cromwell Road, South Kensington) are of printed books, MSS., Oriental books, prints and drawings, Egyptian and Assyrian antiquities, British and medieval antiquities, coins and medals. Each of these eight departments is under a keeper, with an expert staff of subordinates, the head executive officer of the whole museum being styled director and chief librarian. The museum has been enriched by bequests of great importance, especially in the library. Recent legacies have included the porcelain bequeathed by Sir Wollaston Franks, and the valuable collection of works of art (chiefly enamels and gold-smithery) known as the Waddesdon bequest—a legacy of Baron F. de Rothschild. The most important group of acquisition by purchase in the history of the museum is the series of Greek sculptures known as the Elgin Marbles, bought by act of parliament (56 Geo. III. c. 99).
There are four national museums controlled by the Board of Education, until recently styled the Department of Science and Art. The chief of these is the Victoria and Albert Museum at South Kensington. This museum has a dependency at Bethnal Green, the Dublin and Edinburgh museums having been now removed from its directMuseums of the Board of Education. charge. There is also a museum of practical geology in Jermyn Street, containing valuable specimens of pottery and majolica. The Victoria and Albert Museum owed its inception to the Exhibition of 1851, from the surplus funds of which 12 acres of land were bought in South Kensington. First known as the Department of Practical Art, the museum rapidly established itself on a broad basis. Acquisitions of whole collections and unique specimens were accumulated. In 1857 the Sheepshanks gallery of pictures was presented; in 1879 the India Office transferred to the department the collection of Oriental art formerly belonging to the East India Company; in 1882 the Jones bequest of French furniture and decorative art (1740–1810) was received;
