160 JAMES SMITHSON AND HIS BEQUEST. 



and tables regarding the wills and letters of administration of petty 

 officers, seamen, and marines, and a chapter of useful bints to persons 

 about to make their own wills; the whole illustrated with explanatory 

 notes and remarks, being an intelligible and complete, though summary, 

 explanation of the law of wills and testaments.' By the author of 

 'Plain instructions to executors and administrators.'" London, 1S2G, 

 8vo., 94 pages. 



It is noticeable that this book was published in the same year in which 

 Smithson made his will, and that it was carefully studied is evident 

 from his marginal notes, and the fact that he adopted its phraseology 

 in providing an annuity to his faithful servant. His words were not 

 only chosen to accord with the forms of law, but with strict regard to 

 the meaning and scope of the language used. The will, moreover, is in 

 the testator's own handwriting. 



It is an interesting subject of speculation to consider the motives 

 which actuated Smithson in bequeathing his fortune to the United 

 States of America to found an institution in the city of Washington. 



He is not known to have had a single correspondent in America, 

 and in none of his papers is found any reference to it or to its distin- 

 guished men.* It has been alleged that he was more fri( ndly to mon- 

 archical than to republican institutions, but there appears to be no foun- 

 dation for this opinion. It is more probable that, living at a time when 

 all Europe was convulsed with war, when the energies of nations, the 

 thoughts of rulers, and the lives of millions were devoted to eiforts for 

 conquest or to perpetuate despotism, he turned to the free American 

 Republic, where he could discern the germs of rising grandeur, the ele- 

 ments of enduring prosperity, and the aspirations of coining generations. 

 lie undoubtedly felt that in the United States there would be wider scope 

 for the promotion of knowledge, and that in this new country there 

 would always be free thought and indefinite progress. By selecting 

 the nation itself as the depository of his trust he paid the highest com- 

 pliment to its intelligence and integrity, and testified his confidence in 

 republican institutions and his faith in their perpetuity. 



The period in which Smithson lived was not less marked by the 

 gloom occasioned by long-protracted and almost universal war, and 

 the extent and rapidity of its social changes, than by the luster of 

 its brilliant discoveries in science and its useful inventions in the arts. 

 The leaders of contending nations, who had long absorbed the atten- 

 tion of Europe by their struggles for dominion, were at last forced to 

 relinquish some of their honors to the great philosophers whose achieve- 

 ments then illuminated the page of history, and which have not since 

 been surpassed. It was pre-eminently a period of activity of thought. 



" There are only two books in Smithson's library containing references to the United 

 States. Extracts from these relative to the city of Washington are given in the Ap- 

 pendix, Note 9. 



