218 EIGHTH ANNUAL REPORT OF 



proposed to extend their number so as to include a wider range of 

 objects, and to publish them in parts to suit different purposes. Copies 

 will be distributed with the quarto volumes of our publications, and 

 sent to meteorological observers. The tables have been stereotyped, 

 and may therefore be offered for sale at a low rate. 



Since the date of the last Report, a number of separate memoirs 

 have been bound together so as to form the second volume of the series 

 of Smithsonian Contributions. The memoirs, an account of which has 

 just been given, will be ready for distribution during 1852. 



The second volume has been forwarded to all the colleges and other 

 institutions specified in the rules adopted for the distribution of the 

 Smithsonian publications in this country, and to all the first class libra- 

 ries and principal literary and scientific societies abroad. Through the 

 liberality of the members of the Senate of the United States and its 

 officers, we have been enabled to send to our foreign correspondents, 

 in adcHtion to our own publications, copies of reports to Congress, and 

 other works published at the expense of government. In return, the 

 Institution has received a series of flattering acknowledgments and 

 valuable presents, not only of the current numbers of transactions, but 

 in several instances of entire sets of all the volumes. 



The promotion of knowledge is much retarded by the difficulties 

 experienced in the way of a free intercourse between scientific and 

 literary societies in different parts of the world. In carrying on the 

 exchange of the Smithsonian volumes, it was necessary to appoint a 

 number of agents. Some of these are American consuls, and other 

 respectable individuals, who have undertaken in most cases to transact 

 the business free of all charge, and in others for but little more than the 

 actual expense incurred. These agencies being established, other 

 exchanges could be carried on through them and our means of convey- 

 ance, at the slight additional expense owing to the small increase of 

 weight ; and we have accordingly offered the privilege of sending and 

 receiving small packages through our agency to institutions of learning, 

 and in some cases to individuals, wlio choose to avail themselves of it. 

 The offer has been accepted by a number of institutions; and the result 

 cannot fail to prove highly beneficial, by promoting a more ready com- 

 munion between the literature and science of this country and the 

 world abroad. 



As a part of the same system, application was made through Sir 

 Henry Bulwer, the British minister at Washington, for a remission of 

 duties on packages intended for Great Britain ; and we are informed 

 that a permanent arrangement will probably be made, through the 

 agency of the Royal Society, for the free passage through the English 

 custom-house of all packages from this Institution. 



The Smithsonian exchanges are under the special charge of Profes- 

 sor Baird, who has been unwearied in his exertions to collect proper 

 materials, and to reduce tlie whole to such order as \vill combine secu- 

 rity with rapidity of transmission. 



The system of exchange here described has no connexion with that 

 established between national governments by Mr. Vattemare. It is 

 merely an extension of one which has been in operation on a small scale 

 for nearly lialf a century between the American Philosophical Society 



