More than 200 items from the collections of the Musee National de la Marine have come to North America for the first time. The exhibit, sponsored by the Musee National and the Musee de la Civilisation Quebec, can be seen in Wilmington, Delaware, at the First USA Riverfront Arts Center from 16 February to 19 May 2002, under the title "Le Grand Voyage. Treasures of the Musee National de la Marine," and in Salem, Massachusetts, at the Peabody Essex Museum from 12 July to 14 October 2002 as "Rendezvous with the Sea: The Glory of the French Maritime Tradition." The exhibition features items from the past five centuries, including paintings, ship models, navigational instruments, maps, prints and photographs, sculptures and toys. The collection offers a rare opportunity to see superb examples of marine art and artifacts from an era rich in French maritime activity. The following text has been excerpted from the exhibit catalog. King Charles X signed the official act for the founding of the Musee de la Marine in December 1827. The "Musee Dauphin," named for his son, was established at the Louvre with the intent of making the royal collections accessible to the general public. The inspector general of the Navy, Henri Louis Duhamel du Monceau (1700-1782), had already installed his own collection of model ships and dockyard machinery there in 1748 to be used in the instruction of students at the School of Naval Architecture, which he had established a few years earlier. A number of other collections were added, some from the Navy itself, others from the dockyards at Brest, Rochefort and Toulon, where models of vessels had been produced prior to construction of the actual ships. While the museum was initially devoted entirely to the navy, artifacts from voyages of scientific exploration were also included from about 1830, by which time the institution was called the Musee Naval. As of 1836 the collection was extended to the fine arts with an extensive addition of drawings, marble busts and paintings. New dockyard models were regularly added as new ships were designed and built. Francois Edmond Paris was appointed director in 1871 and undertook an ambitious acquisition policy. He travelled around the world twice, bringing back plans of all types of vessels, and ordered more than 230 models built, mostly nonEuropean boats, but also pleasure and fishing craft from the North Atlantic and Mediterranean. He also added numerous volumes and ship's plans to the library. In the early 1900s the ethnographic collection was dispersed and a sizeable collection on merchant vessels was started and continued to grow through donations from various shipping companies and shipyards. Between 1939 and 1943 the Musee de la Marine, as it was then called, moved from the Louvre to the Palais de Chaillot. It was further expanded with collections from various ports, primarily work from model and sculpture workshops. Today the Musee National de la Marine, with its head office and main site at the Palais de Chaillot in Paris, also has seven large exhibition centers along the coast, all under the French Ministry of Defence. First USA Riverfront Arts Center: 800 South Madison Street, Wilmington DE 19801; 888 862-ARTS; web site: www.riverfrontwilmington.com Peabody Essex Museum: 1 East India Square, Salem MA 01970; 978 745-6776; web site: www.pem.org -- For Revolutionary War information on the Internet, your first choice should be AMERICANREVOLUTION.ORG