HISTORICAIv RE;SE;ARCH — JAMESON. 197 



As nearly 250 letters had previously been copied in Virginia and North Caro- 

 lina, there are now on hand about 500 letters. Further extensive copying 

 will be postponed until experiments now in progress, founded on suggestions 

 made at the Congress on Facsimiles at Liege, have demonstrated whether or 

 not the copying can be done as economically and rapidly by some photo- 

 graphic process. If so, the advantage will be great in the matter of proof- 

 reading, since the scattered situation of the originals will make collation of 

 proof-sheets with them a difficult matter. 



Miscellaneous Operations. 

 So far as possible, all important inquiries addressed to the department by 

 serious students have been answered, especially such as related to historical 

 materials in Washington. The correspondence increases so rapidly that it 

 amounts to three or four times what it was two years ago. 



Under the supervision of the department, but at the expense of the Michi- 

 gan Pioneer and Historical Society, large portions of the papers of Henry R. 

 Schoolcraft, at the Library of Congress and the Smithsonian Institution, 

 have been copied for the society. In a similar manner, a large number of 

 documents relating to the Illinois country during the period from the expedi- 

 tion of Gen. George Rogers Clark to the organization of the Northwest 

 Territory have been copied for the Illinois State Historical Library, and a 

 lesser number, relating to the period of Spanish rule in Missouri, and derived 

 from the archives of the United States and of Cuba, for the Missouri Histor- 

 ical Society. The effort is constantly made to exhibit toward historical socie- 

 ties and State historical departments, as well as toward individual students, 

 a helpful spirit. It is possible that success in mutual cooperation of this sort 

 may be furthered by the return of the director to the position of Chairman of 

 the Historical Manuscripts Commission of the AmiCrican Historical Associa- 

 tion, which he occupied for some years at its inception. It is certain that it 

 has been signally furthered by the personal visits which Mr. Leland has paid 

 during the past year, in the course of the searches mentioned in a preceding 

 paragraph, to historical societies and public archives in Richmond, Raleigh, 

 Columbia, Charleston, Savannah, Atlanta, Montgomery, Mobile, New 

 Orleans, Nashville, Louisville, Frankfort, and Charleston, West Virginia. 

 Many favors and courtesies have been received from such organizations by 

 various members of the staff. As instances of possible usefulness on our part 

 may be mentioned aid rendered the archivist of West Virginia in locating 

 certain bodies of material, and the discovery at the Department of State of a 

 large body of North Carolina archive-matter which has since been restored 

 to the State. 



An instance of cooperation upon a wider field is the appointment of Mr. 

 Leland, with the consent of the director, to supply each year the American 



