14 NINTH ANNUAL REPORT OP 



Carolina, and Professor A. E. Church, of West Point. In the language 

 of one of the examiners : " The solutions of the problems relating to 

 the circles, though not entirely original, are yet brought more directly to 

 depend upon the fundamental principle of tangency as enunciated by 

 the author, and are more elegant, than those given in any works with 

 which I am acquainted. The paper also presents the only clear and 

 complete explanation of the number of solutions and of the various 

 positions of the tangent circles (and spheres) in each case that I have 

 seen. I have not been able to find heretofore any complete solutions 

 of ail the problems relating to the sphere. Those of the author of the 

 memoir are accurate, and easy to be understood by any person familiar 

 with the elements of solid and descriptive geometry, and I think their 

 publication will furnish a valuable addition to geometrical knowledge.' 



It is a fact not without interest, that an officer of the army is enabled, 

 while discharging his duty at a distant post of the frontier of our country, 

 to concentrate his thoughts, and exercise his talents, on so abstruse a 

 part of pure mathematics. The paper will be illustrated by three 

 engraved plates in quarto. 



5. A dictionary of the Chippewa language has been offered to the 

 Smithsonian Institution for publication by the Rev. S. A. Belcourt, a 

 missionary among the Indians of British America. He has devoted 23 

 years to the study of" this language. He urges its adoption by the In- 

 stitution on the ground that in all probability this work, which, to use 

 his own language, " has cost me so many years of labor and nights of 

 thought, and which, in my humble opinion, will be valuable to science 

 and philanthropy, especially to philology, will forever be lost; and who 

 would undertake a work of such maonitude after learning the fate of 

 this?" 



The language of the Ojibewas, according to the author, is the parent 

 of all the dialects existing from the mouth of the St. Lawrence north 

 and following the 27th parallel to the source of the Missouri. Were 

 the present funds of the Institution sufficient for the purpose we should 

 not hesitate to accept this work, and we are not entirely wathout hope 

 that some means may be procured independent of the Institution to de- 

 fray a considerable portion of the expense of its publication. 



Correspondence. — During the past year the Institution has received 

 a large number of communications asking information on a variety of 

 subjects, particularly in regard to tlie solution of scientific questions, the 

 names and characters of objects of natural history, and the analysis of 

 soils, minerals, and other materials which pertain to the industrial re- 

 sources of the country. Answers have in all cases been given to these 

 inquiries, either directly by the offic^f^rs of the Institution, or by reports 

 from the Smithsonian colaborers. \'ery frequently certificates are re- 

 quested as to the value of certain minerals, with a view to bring them 

 into market ; but in these cases the inquirers are referred to certain re- 

 liable anal3lical chemists, who make a business of operations of this 

 kind. The information procured and given at the expense of the Insti- 

 tution is such as lelates to the general diffusion of knowledge, and not 

 to that which may immediately tend to advance the pecuniary interest 

 of individuals. Requests are often also made to have experiments in- 

 stituted for testing proposed applications of science to the arts; and 



