316 SPENCER FULLERTON BAIRD 



former from being the good wife of an ichthyologist, the latter as 

 being handy with the quill. Well, I won't make fun of your hand- 

 writing, even if you have used the same quill without mending since 

 you have been in Europe, and its nib getting broader and broader 

 each day for your letters are glorious and mirth-provoking, and 

 soul-inspiring, and greatly refreshing, and it is not for my own intrinsic 

 merit that I have been gifted by Providence by that wonderfully 

 beautiful chirography which makes even my masters hang themselves 

 for sheer envy. 



I wish you were here to talk over the thousand and one things 

 which suggest themselves, and which can be so scantily represented 

 in a letter. Every day brings something new. As to the Smithsonian, 

 as Haldeman calls it, we are now in a state of uncertainty. I wrote 

 you that a committee had been appointed to report whether the 

 compromise should be abolished. 19 This has not yet been reported, 

 nor have I heard that it has been called together. They will probably 

 give the thing a thorough overhauling, but their decision is uncertain. 

 This Committee consists of Pearce, Totten, Mason, Maury, Choate. 

 How they can report in favor of removing the restrictions in favor of 

 the Library and Museum, with the plain law before them, I cannot 

 see; matters Smithsonian are being talked about a good deal, and 

 much opposition is manifested towards some of Prof. Henry's views, 

 but which side will carry the day "quien sabe." In the present 

 arrangement, the Library and Museum are to occupy jointly the 

 large room of the lower story of the main building, while the new 

 lecture room goes into the middle of the splendid room upstairs, 

 cutting this up into one large apartment and a small no account one 

 on each side. The present lecture room is to be converted into a 

 house for Professor Henry, so that the only refuge for collections will 

 be the single room aforesaid. The whole middle building will be 

 finished in four or five months and we shall breathe freer with any 

 additional accommodations. Our great lack will, however, be for 

 office and work rooms. 



There is earnest talk of constructing a great iron crystal palace 

 on the vacant square between the Smithsonian and the (Washington) 

 Monument in which to place all the Government collections in Natural 



19 That is, whether more funds shall be allotted to the Library 

 and less to the other functions of the Institution than at present. 



