1. An example of one of the most splendid of these can be glimpsed from the sale catalogue of Margaret Cavendish Harley, Duchess Dowager of Portland: A Catalogue of the Portland Museum, lately the property of the Duchess Dowager of Portland, Deceased: Which will be sold by auction, by Mr.Skinner & Co., n.p., n.p., 1786.
2. See E. Mendes da Costa, “Notes and Anecdotes of Literati, Collectors, &c. from a ms. by the late Mendes de [sic] Costa, and Collected between 1747 and 1788”, The Gentleman’s Magazine, 1812, (1):205–207 and 513–516.
3. A. J. Desallier d’Argenville, La Conchyliologie ou Histoire naturelle des coquilles… Troisième édition par MM. de Favanne de Mont cervelle père et fils, Paris, DeBure, 1780, p. 193.
4. British Museum, Add. ms. 28540, fol. 156. The nine volumes of da Costa’s correspondence in the British Museum (Add. mss. 28534–28546) provide an excellent picture of natural history collecting in the second half of the eighteenth century.
5. Ibid. See Altick, The Shows of London, for a description of the popularity of collections.