12 REPORT OF THE SECRETARY. 



A principal motive for offering: these prizes is to call attention to the 

 Hodgkius fund and the purposes for which it exists, and accordin«>ly 

 this circular is sent to the priiudpal universities, and to all learned 

 societies known to the Institution, as w^ell as to rei)resentative men of 

 science in every nation. Suggestions and recommendations in regard 

 to the most effective application of this fund are invited. 



It is probable that special grants of money may be made to special- 

 ists engaged in original investigation upon atmospheric air and its 

 properties. Applications for grants of this nature should have the 

 indorsement of some recognized academy of sciences or other institu- 

 tion of learning, and should be accompanied by evidences of the 

 capacity of the applicant in the form of at least one memoir already 

 l)ublished by him, based npon original investigation. 



To prevent misapprehension of the founder's wishes it is repeated 

 that the discoveries or applications proper to be brought to the con- 

 sideration of the committee of award may be in the held of any 

 science or any art withont restriction; provided only that they have to 

 do with "the nature and properties of atmospheric air in connection 

 with the welfare of man." 



Information of any kind desired by persons intending to become 

 comi)etitors will be furnished on apidicatior.. 



All communications in regard to the Hodgkins fund, the Hodgkins 

 prizes, the Hodgkins medals, and the Hodgkins fund publications, or 

 applications for grants of money, should be addressed to S. P. Langley, 

 Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, Washington, U. S. A. 



[SEAL.] S. P. LANCILEY, 



Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution. 

 Washington, March 31, 1893. 



Some desire being expressed for a more explicit declaration of the 

 scope of the investigations permitted by the Hodgkins foundation, 

 the following supplementary circular was issued in April, 1893, in further 

 explanation of the purport of the donor's intentions : 



SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION. 

 HODGKINd PRIZES. 



Washington, April, 1893. 



In answer to inquiries and in further exj^lanation of statements made 

 in the Hodgkins circular, it may be added that any branch of natural 

 science may offer a subject of discussion for the Hodgkins prizes, where 

 this subject is related to the study of the atmosphere in connection 

 with the welfare of man. 



Thus, the anthropologist may consider the history of man as affected 

 by climate through "the atmosphere; the geologist may study in this 

 special connection the crust of the earth, whose constituents and whose 

 form are largely modified by atmospheric influences; the botanist, tlie 

 atmospheric relations of the life of the plant; the electrician, the atmos- 

 pheric electricity; the mathematician and physicist, problems of ai'ro- 

 dynamics in their utilitarian application; and so on through the circle 

 of the natural sciences, both biological and physical, of which there is 

 perhaps not one which is necessarily excluded. 



In explanation of the donor's wishes, which the Institution desires 

 scrupulously to observe, it may be added that Mr. Hodgkins illus- 



