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THE USE AND ABUSE OF MUSEUMS.*
IT is a remarkable fact that, although public Blusoums have
existed in this country for more than a century and a quarter,
and there ar0 now a very groat number of Museums of one
sort or another, hardly anything has been written about their
general principles of management and economy. In the
English language, at least, there is apparently not a single
treatise analysing the purposes and kinds of Museums, or
describing systematically the modes of arrangement. In the
course of this article I shall have occasion to refer to a certain
number of lectures, addresses, or papers which have touched
more or less expressly upon this subject; but these are all of
a slight and brief character. The only work at all pretending
to a systematic form with which I am acquainted is that upon
rr Tho Administrative Economy of the Fine Arts in England,”
by Mr. Edward Edwards, of the British Museum. But this
book was printed as long ago a8 1840, and has long been
forgotten, if indeed it could ever have been said to be known.
Moreover it is mostly concerned with the principles of management
of art galleries, schools of art, and the like. Many of
the ideas put forward by Edwarda have since been successfully
fathered by better-known men, and some of his suggestions,
such as that of multiplying fncsimilee of the best works of art,
are only now approaching realisation.
It is true, indeed, that a great deal of inquiry has taken
Written in 1881-82.