Page:The museum, (Jackson, Marget Talbot, 1917).djvu/203

Rh PRINTS The care and installation of a print collection is a subject by itself, requiring an expert knowledge of both museum and library methods. An ordinary print collection contains too many "specimens" to exhibit all of them at once, so that the problems of storage and cataloguing become of greater importance than the problems of exhibition.

Let us consider some of the processes a print goes through on entering a collection. It is first of all identified and entered in the accessions list and given a number. Then it must be stamped on the back in some place where the paper is well covered with ink (i. e. where the stamp will not show through on the right side) with the device of the museum or collection. The Kupferstich Kabinet in Berlin uses a small brass mould into which gelatine is poured to make a die or stamp. The advantage of this over a metal stamp is obvious, for it is soft enough to be used on the thinnest India paper without danger to the print. Rubber stamps may also be used, but a fine type can be made more legible with the gelatine, and as soon as the impression begins to be unsatisfactory the gelatine may be melted over and a fresh die prepared. Great care must be taken in