THE SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION. 



457 



Grubb siderostat, a spectro-bolometer constructed by Grunow & 

 Son, and a galvanometer. These instruments, in the hands of 

 Prof. Langley, are producing remarkable results, considering the 

 inferior building and unsatisfactory site. It is to be hoped that 

 these conditions will speedily be improved through Congressional 

 appropriations. 



HoDdKiNs Fund and Prizes. Previous to the year 1891 the 

 Smithsonian Fund had received only two small additions by gifts 

 or bequests : one thousand dollars from Mr. James Hamilton in 

 1875, and five hundred dollars from Mr. Simeon Habel in 1880. 

 In the year 1891, however, Mr. Thomas G. Hodgkins, of Setauket, 

 N. Y., made the handsome donation of two hundred thousand 

 dollars to the general fund, with certain conditions. In the for- 

 mal statement of Mr. Hodgkins, dated September 22, 1891, he 

 used these words : " This fund, to be called the Hodgkins Fund, 

 and all premiums, prizes, grants, or publications made at its cost, 

 are to be designated by this name ; the interest of one hundred 

 thousand dollars of this fund to be permanently devoted to the 

 increase and diffusion of more exact knowledge in regard to the 

 nature and properties of atmospheric air, in connection with the 

 welfare of man in his daily 

 life, and in his relations to 

 his Creator, the same to be 

 effected by the offering of 

 prizes, for which competi- 

 tion shall be open to the 

 world, for essays in which 

 important truths regarding 

 the phenomena on which life, 

 health, and human happi- 

 ness depend shall be em- 

 bodied, or by such other 

 means as in years to come 

 may appear to the Regents 

 of the Smithsonian Institu- 

 tion calculated to produce 

 the most beneficent results." 



To carry out the wishes 

 of the donor, the following 

 provisions for prizes, essays, 

 and the Hodgkins medal 

 were adopted by the insti- 

 tution, and announced in a circular issued in March, 1892 : 



1. A prize of ten thousand dollars for a treatise embodying 

 some new and important discovery in regard to the nature or 

 properties of atmospheric air. 



J. W. I'OWELL. 



