Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 28.djvu/277

Rh follows: "It is quite possible to so arrange and subsequently conduct a museum that it will be as much more effectual in this way (educational) than any art-gallery or library, as Nature herself is greater and more instructive than any imperfect imitations of her ever set in frames or between the covers of books." In his report for 1882 he says that there have been many requests for reference series for consultation, and he suggests that money be raised for the purpose of placing series of specimens illustrating different natural groups so that they may be handled by those having sufficient interest in the subject. This is an important suggestion, and, if it can be carried out, will greatly raise the educational standard of the Natural History Museum. He also suggests that descriptive catalogues of the museum be issued and distributed at frequent intervals.

In order to render the museum a true guide to the study of natural history, to make it, in fact, a natural system in itself, and to illustrate all the forms in a definite and natural manner, Professor Hyatt has adopted a superior plan of arrangement. Let us take, for example, the mineral and geological collection, which is now nearly completely arranged. First of all, the elements are shown, then the elements which enter into rock formations in an elementary form. Then there is a series of what might be called rock-elements—that is, rocks which are composed of one mineral, such as mica or limestone. We are then prepared for the final stage of rock-mixtures—such as conglomerates, granites, etc. Next are taken up the rocks as they are formed, either sedimentary or igneous, and so on through the whole rock-world, going step by step in a most natural way from the simplest to the most complex, from the elements to their compounds. This is the natural system, and is being adopted in other departments of the museum.

Such is Professor Hyatt's work. He is a scientist in every sense of the word, and holds a high rank among naturalists. Still, he is able to find time to render science popular—a great work, which scientists are not apt to appreciate and which few try to do. It is an important work, and the only way firmly to establish science upon the world; and that small body of men who are so unselfishly devoting their time to this grand work are deserving of far more credit than those who selfishly shut themselves from the rest of the world, and laboriously work away at abstruse problems, which, after they are discovered, are put in such terms as to be unintelligible to the average person. We repeat it, that those who are doing their best to render science popular are doing far more for true science than those who purposely shun such work, and confine themselves to uninteresting and often unimportant problems.