8 EEPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1915. 



States," thus stamping the Museum at the very outset as one of the 

 widest range and at the same time as the Museum of the United 

 States. It was also appreciated that additions would be necessary 

 to the collections then in existence, and provision was made for their 

 increase by the exchange of duplicate specimens, by donations, and 

 by other means. 



If the wisdom of Congress in so fully providing for a museum in 

 the Smithsonian law challenges attention, the interpretation put 

 upon this law by the Board of Eegents within less than six months 

 from the passage of the act can not but command admiration. In the 

 early part of September, 1846, the Eegents took steps toward formu- 

 lating a plan of operations. The report of the committee appointed 

 for this purpose, submitted in December and January following, 

 shows a thorough consideration of the subject in both the spirit and 

 letter of the law. It would seem not out of place to cite here the first 

 pronouncement of the board with reference to the character of the 

 Museum : 



"In obedience to the requirements of the charter,^ which leaves 

 little discretion in regard to the extent of accommodations to be pro- 

 vided, your committee recommend that there be included in the build- 

 ing a museum of liberal size, fitted up to receive the collections des- 

 tined for the Institution. * * * 



"As important as the cabinets of natural history by the charter 

 required to be included in the Museum, your committee regard its 

 ethnological portion, including all collections that may supply items 

 in the physical history of our species, and illustrate the manners, 

 customs, religions, and progressive advance of the various nations of 

 the world ; as, for example, collections of skulls, skeletons, portraits, 

 dresses, implements, weapons, idols, antiquities, of the various races 

 of man. * * * In this connexion your committee recommend 

 the passage of resolutions asking the cooperation of certain public 

 functionaries and of the public generally in furtherance of the 

 above objects. 



" Your committee are further of opinion that in the Museum, if the 

 funds of the Institution permit, might judiciously be included various 

 series of models illustrating the progi'ess of some of the most useful 

 inventions; such, for example, as the steam engine from its earliest 

 and rudest form to its present most improved state ; but this they pro- 

 pose only so far as it may not encroach on ground already covered 

 by the numerous models in the Patent Office. 



" Specimens of staple materials, of their gradual manufacture, and 

 of the finished product of manufactures and the arts may also, your 



^ Since the Institution was not chartered in a legal sense, but established by 

 Congress, the use of the word " charter " in this connection was not correct. 



