JOURNAL OF PROCEEDINGS. 127 



to it by a resolution of this Board, at the last meeting, viz, for the 

 erection of a large but comparatively inexpensive building, annexed to 

 the present edifice, to contain these great accessions to the museum, 

 would do away with the present embarrassment in that regard. The 

 suggested acquisition by Government of the present Smithsonian edi- 

 fice, already mainly filled with its collections, would give a desirable 

 unity and prominence to the National Museum, and might sufficiently 

 miark that "definite distinction between the two establishments" which 

 our Secretary suggests as needful. We agree that a more mark<^d dis- 

 tinction than now appears to exist is desirable, for the avoidance of 

 present misapprehension and future complication. 



But we apprehend that both these desirable changes may not suffi- 

 ciently provide against the danger that the Smithsonian Institution may 

 become wholly subsidiary t« the museum, and be perhaps crippled by 

 it. The Institution has only one executive officer, with undivided 

 responsibility, who may, with our consent, "employ assistants," but we 

 look to him alone, and all must pass through his hands. His scientific 

 labors in conducting the Institution, not to speak of those somewhat 

 extraneous, of which he might possibly be relieved, are various, impor- 

 tant, and exacting. Much will be lost if the executive head of this 

 Institution shall be other than a man of broad scientific culture and 

 experience, commanding the regard of the scientific world, and the con- 

 fidence of the many who depend upon his judgment. His time and 

 powers must be divided between such duties as are here referred to, and 

 those of administration. Now the proportion which the museum bears 

 to the Institution proper is already large, and it threatens to be pre- 

 dominant. We have no desire to check its immense development, and 

 we contemplate with satisfaction its sure popularity ; but, as respects 

 the burden which the museum throws upon our Secretary, we may say 

 that it is already heavy, and that it threatens to be injuriously large. 

 If not provided against, the time seems sure to come when the museum 

 will mainly absorb the working energies of the Institution. 



In the next place we must all agree that the looking after congress- 

 ional appropriations in the present mode is not desirable. The Secre- 

 tary has called attention to this. An objectionable feature would be 

 removed if the appropriations were made directly in the name of the 

 National Museum, and if it became possessed of the present edifice. But 

 still the duty of preparing or supervising and of anxiously furthering the 

 annual appropriations for the museum, would devolve upon our Secretary. 



We would also remark that this great museum must have a large 

 number of employes, many times more than the Institution itself needs 

 for its uses. This great extension of patronage cannot be contemplated 

 without anxiety. Under the present organization this patronage is 

 vested in the Secretary. So far as the Institution is concerned, it were 

 much better not to have it. On the other hand it may well be that the 



