A.

United States loan.

From United States stocks.

737,597 68

737,597 68

B.-Statement showing the description and amount of stocks held by the Secretary of the Treasury in trust on account of the Smithsonian fund, including their market price and value at such price.

Description of stock.

Amount of
stock.

Present mar-
ket price.

Value at mar-
ket price.

Interest due on these bonds January 1, 1854, $361,636 32.
No interest is paid on these bonds other than what is
received on account of certain amounts which, from
time to time, are ascertained to be due the State of
Arkansas on account of the 5 per cent. fund accruing
to said State from the net proceeds of lands sold with-
in said State; which amounts, when ascertained, are
applied to the payment of interest due on these bonds,
as authorized under the provisions of a joint resolu-
tion of Congress, approved March 3, 1845.
$8,000 00 Interest due on this stock January 1, 1854, $960. Inte-
rest paid and applied as authorized under the joint re-
solution of Congress of March 3, 1845, from the net
proceeds of sales of public lands in said State, and the
amount now due may be expected to be paid when the
next adjustment of these sales is made the ensuing
spring.

52,000 00 Interest due on this stock January 1, 1854, $6,720. In-
terest paid and applied as authorized under the joint
resolution of Congress of March 3, 1845, from the net
proceeds of sales of public lands in said State, and the
amount now due may be expected to be paid when
the next adjustment of these sales is made the ensuing
spring.

19,500 00
59,050 00

Interest paid by the State of Ohio as it becomes due in
January and July of each year.

Interest paid by the United States as it becomes due in
January and July of each year.

13,000

98

89 to 90

96

56,000 00

20,544 00

33,400 00

121 & int. 2 ms.

40,750 00

State of Ohio 6 per cent.-Ohio Canal stock, 1860

United States 6 per cent. stock, as follows:

C.

D.

Shortly after the receipt of the above statements by the chairman of the committee, there was presented to the House of Representatives the following memorial from the Smithsonian Institution:

To the honorable the Senate and House of Representatives, in Congress assembled:

GENTLEMEN: The Board of Regents of the Smithsonian Institution have directed me to transmit to your honorable body the resolution appended to this communication, and to solicit the passage of a law in accordance therewith.

It is known to your honorable body, that the original sum received into the United States treasury from the Smithsonian bequest, was a little more than $515,000, and that at the time of the passage of the act incorporating the institution $242,000 had accrued in interest, which sum, or so much of it as might be deemed necessary, the regents were authorized to appropriate to a building.

In consideration, however, of the great demands upon the institution for "the increase and diffusion of knowledge among men," the regents, instead of immediately expending this sum on the building have carefully husbanded it, and have extended the time of the erection of the building over several years, and have defrayed the expense in part out of the proceeds of this sum, and in part out of such portions of the income of the original fund as could be spared from the operations of the institution. The building will be completed in a few months in fire-proof materials and in a very substantial manner, and besides the money required to pay the contractor, there is now on hand $150,000 of accrued interest.

This sum the regents ask to be allowed to place in the treasury of the United States with the original bequest, and to add to it, from time to time, such other sums as may come into their possession by donation or otherwise, until the sum thus added shall amount to $

The sole object of this request is the permanent investment and perpetual security of the accumulated fund, and when your honorable body is assured that the operations of the institution have received the approbation of the wise and good in every part of the world where literature and science are cultivated, the undersigned trusts that the request will be granted.

And your petitioner will ever pray, &c.

JOSEPH HENRY, Secretary of Smithsonian Institution.

; re

The statement made to the select committee by the Secretary of the Treasury shows that the government, by an act of Congress, set apart as the capital of the Smithsonian fund, the sum of $ garding those States that have failed to make payment of principal or interest of the sums loaned to them from the fund received from England as debtors to the Treasury of the United States, leaving the fund unencumbered with accounts against the borrowers, and equal to the amount left by the testator.

What disposition should be made of the evidences of debts which the government of the United States holds against the borrowers of the

original fund, did not form a part of the inquiries which the committee was authorized to make. But as those funds evidently belong to the government of the United States, the committee will feel itself justified in suggesting such a disposal thereof as will release the books of the Treasury Department of the continued and increasing accounts. And at the close of the report a resolution will be added recommending the sale of all such assets, and that the net proceeds be carried to the general fund.

The memorial of the Smithsonian Institution, asking for permission to invest a portion of the fund saved in the construction of the building, for which purpose it had been appropriated, suggested to the joint committee enquiries as to the probable demands which would be made upon the income of the institution; and that led to a further inquiry as to the legitimate objects for expenditure. These inquiries could only be answered by a recurrence to the will of the distinguished testator; and if that should be less explicit in any particular than would be desirable, then a recurrence could be had to the well established facts of his life, and the special objects which he pursued in his devotion to science; and the end which he proposed in his pursuits while alive, and the special directions of his estate after the death of the person to whom was bequeathed a life use of his property.

• Committees of Congress have several times presented statements of the objects of Mr. Smithson's bequest to the government of the United States in trust, and their opinion of the mode in which these objects should be attained, and proceedings have been had, founded on the acts of Congress, that have been consequent upon these reports. And the institution has been established, and been made most beneficially operative by a "direction," which has been careful to administer its affairs in the spirit of congressional enactments.

The Smithsonian Institution, however, is unique in its character, and it is brought into action at a time when science is advancing beyond all precedent, and when the learned and the scientific of the old world are demanding from the United States not merely a sympathy in their labors, but a contribution to the amount of knowledge and science with which the world has already been enriched.

With the constant demands upon the institution, and the constant efforts to respond to these demands, it is not strange that it should be found occasionally necessary to enquire whether its administration is maintained with a constant eye to that progression which the advancement of science renders necessary; and whether every plan which was hesitatingly but carefully adopted in the establishment of the institution is productive of the exact result which was contemplated on its formation, and whether any of its minor divisions impinge upon the more important branches, and thus diminish the means of usefulness on the whole, and delay the attainment of these objects, which are properly the end of the great establishment.

To judge correctly of such matters it is not only necessary to know what has been done by the institution, but what was the plan of those by whom it was inaugurated; and especially it is important to compare the proceedings of the institution with the will of its testator, and to ascertain whether what he proposed has been in any degree attained,