8. • REPORT OF THE SECRETARY. 



BUILDINGS. 



Smithsonian Building. — The appropriation of Congress, available on 

 January 1, for the recoustructiou of the eastern range and wing was 

 iusufBcieut to complete it, and an additional sum of $15,000 was granted 

 at the first session of the Forty-eighth Congress. This was expended 

 in fitting up the two upper stories of the building, which had been 

 necessarily left unfinished for lack of funds. This included the intro- 

 duction of iron furring and iron lathing for the ceilings immediately 

 under the roof — a measure very necessary for the comfort of the occu- 

 pants of the rooms below them. It was impossible, however, to find 

 the means for plastering, which yet remains to be done. 



With the additional appropriation many of the rooms were fitted up 

 specially ibr their requirements, including a post-ofUce, which is used 

 by nearly liOO persons — equal in the amount of mail distributed daily to 

 that of a village of considerable size. 



In view of the difficulty of making the electric connections answer a 

 satisfactory purpose, it was thought best to make i^rovision for intro- 

 ducing the pneumatic clock system whenever occasion allowed, and for 

 this purpose the air-tubes were inserted, to which the regulator-clock 

 and the dials in the several rooms can be fitted at any time. A similar 

 provision was made for the oral annunciator — an arrangement by which 

 communication can be established direct at a central station between 

 the pipes leading to any two rooms in the building, thus facilitating com- 

 munication and obviating the use of several telephones. A few tele- 

 j)hones have been introduced, more especially with reference to connec- 

 tion with the switchboard in the National Museum, and by which 

 communication is established with all parts of that building, as well as 

 with the city systems of exchange and those of the Departments. 



By the courtesy of the Superintendent of the Observatory, and at but 

 slight expense, a control-clock was set up in the National Museum 

 building, as also in that of the Smithsonian Institution, these being reg- 

 ulated at noon each day by communication direct from the Observatory. 

 In this way the important desideratum of accurate time is obtained. 



The rooms in the reconstructed portion of the building are now all 

 occupied for the general purposes of the Institution, notably the depart- 

 ments of administration, of international and miscellaneous exchanges, 

 of the reference library, of transportation, and of publication. Several 

 rooms are occupied by artists employed in connection with the work of 

 the Institution, or persons who are engaged in preparing special reports 

 upon collections and explorations made by them under the direction of 

 the Smithsonian Institution, the Fish Commission, and the United States 

 Signal Ofljce. Three rooms have been fitted up as a special chemical 

 laboratory, in charge of Dr. Kidder, the chemist of the United States 

 Fish Commission ; and all work in the way of rating of thermometers, 

 barometers, and hydrometers is under his direction, as also that coi}- 



