200 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSETTM, 1903. 



The west wing and connecting range were completed externally, and 

 the hall of the gallery of art (intended to be used teraporaril}^ for the 

 library) was well advanced. Work upon the bookcases was in prog- 

 ress. The foundations of the main part of the building, including 

 the towers, were laid, and the superstructure carried about 5 feet 

 high. The campanile, octagonal towers, and two smaller corner 

 towers of the center building were 30 feet above their foundations. 



1849. 



The entire Smithsonian building, according to the annual statement 

 of the building committee for 1849, was under roof before winter, the 

 work having been pushed to protect the large amount of masonry and 

 woodwork. The central front towers and four corner towers of the 

 main ))uilding were carried up as high as the walls of that l)uilding, 

 and the central rear tower 30 feet high. The work of fitting the west 

 wing and connecting range for temporary library purposes was still 

 in progress. The east wing was taken possession of for the uses of 

 the Institution April 10, 1849. 



The following changes were made during the year: The lecture hall, 

 as originally constructed, in the east wing, proving entirely too small, 

 the adjoining apparatus and laboratory rooms were removed and the 

 entire wing formed into one large lecture hall provided with seats for 

 1,000 persons. The proposed lecture room in the lower main hall 

 was given up, and the space thus obtained was divided, a room 65 ])y 

 50 feet being assigned as a depository for physical apparatus, the 

 remaining space being allotted to the library. The east range was to 

 be used for the laboratory and working apparatus rooms, connecting 

 on the one side with the lecture hall and on the other with the 

 apparatus museum. 



The two stairways, which in the original plan were carried up 

 between the two north front towers and the main building, were 

 dispensed with and the place the}^ occupied added to the library, 

 as was also the central hall, and, as before said, a portion of the 

 proposed lecture hall. The space for the library was thereby nearly 

 doubled in size, and the staircase was to occup}' the interior of one of 

 the front towers. A clerestory to the long upper room, or museum, 

 of the main l)uilding was adopted by the committee, but was never 

 constructed. 



Secretary Henry's part in the above changes is thus referred to in 

 his report for 1849: 



The plan of the Smithsonian building wan designed l)y the architect and recom- 

 mended to the Board by a committee of the Regents before the programme of organi- 

 zation was adopted. It is not strange, therefore, when the building came to be 

 occiipied, that changes in the internal arrangement should be deemed advisable, 

 which would better udaj^t it to the wants of the Institution. Such changes, at my 



