ON SCIENTIFIC INSTITUTIONS (DUBLIN).
ix cost of which is estimated at 300 /.
To these must be added a sum of 230 L9 for finishing the Palm-house recently erected by the Board of Public Works.
The Council are fully impressed with the necessity of having; these works executed, and trust that provision shall be made for it accordingly; the entire sum would not aU be required in one year.
6.
Library.
The Library has grown to its present magnitude chiefly through purchases, but also to a considerable extent by donations.
Although ample available space exists for its proper arrangement, yet, from want of funds for shelvings and fittings, a large number of the books remains almost inaccessible.
The Society should therefore be, as soon as possible, placed in funds to fit up and finish this Department, for which a sum of 1,405 /.
10 5.
has been estimated.
7.
School of Art.
The School of Art is placed in connection with the Society by the Department of Science and Art, and is governed by the Council according to the rules laid down for the management of the several Schools of Art throughout the Kingdom.
It is stated on evidence to be in a very efficient state.
Museum of Irish Industry.
In the year 1844 the Government determined not only to give increased efficiency to the Museum of Economic Geology, then temporarily established in Craig's-court, Charing Cross, and now the Museum of Practical Geology in 1924.
Jerrnyn-street, but* also to found a similar one at Dublin.
This is apparent from the letter of the Chief Commissioner of Woods and Forests, Lord Lincoln (now Duke of Newcastle), to whom the carrying out of this resolution was entrusted.
It is dated 13th January 1845, and will be found at length in the Appendix.
From this letter it is clear that the contemplated Irish Museum was intended to be for the Irish branch of the geological survey what the London 1924-85.
Museum was for that of England.
In the course of the correspondence arising out of the offer of the position of Curator and Chemist to Sir R.
Kane, Sir Robert laid before Lord Lincoln the views on an economic or industrial survey of Ireland, which he had submitted to Lord Adare's Commission in 1842, and urged upon him the importance of extend-12%6-ing the objects of the new institution to the Industrial Arts generally.
The Government, however, decided upon confining the objects of the Irish institution, in a great measure, to those of the kindred institution in London.
Lord Lincoln's 1396.
letter, above referred to, shows, however, that his Lordship was prepared to allow the Irish institution, in addition to the special objects for which it was originaUy intended, to embrace others suggested by the peculiar circumstances of Ireland.
It was evidently with this view* that Sir Robert Kane was promoted from the subordinate position of Chemist and Curator, under Sir H.
De la Beehe, 1286, to that of Director.
In 1847, when Lord Morpeth, now Earl of Carlisle, became Chief Commissioner of Woods, Sir R.
Kane again recommended the enlarge-1411.
ment of the scope of the museum so as to embrace manufactures generahy, and suggested that the name should be changed so as to express this enlargement of the objects of the museum.
Lord Carlisle proposed the name, Museum of 1451.
Irish Industry, by which the institution has since been designated.
The premises in Stephen's Green, which had formerly been a private resi-1924' dence, were acquired in 1846.
Some rooms were at once temporarily fitted up to receive the collections of minerals, rocks, fossils, and of the Irish fauna and flora, made under the direction of the late General Portlock by the officers of the Ordnance Survey of Ireland, and which were then in charge of the local director of the Geological Survey of Ireland, Captain, now Colonel Sir Henry James.
The offices of the Survey were also transferred there.
The length of time occupied 3202.
in the erection of the buildings of the new museum from 1847 to 1852 was very 3227!
495-b injurious
