828 PROCEEDINGS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY. 



From what has been already said, it will be readily seen that the 

 only way in which the problem before us could be satisfactorily dealt 

 with was by recasting and re-arranging the whole Code. This has been 

 done and the result submitted to the Academy in print during the 

 past few days. 



The principal changes, beside those already referred to, are (i) the 

 fixing of the limit of the number of Fellows at Six hundred, — those 

 residing in Massachusetts not to exceed Four hundred, as provided in 

 the amended Charter ; (ii) raising the limit of the Annual Dues, to be 

 annually voted and determined by the Academy, from Ten dollars to 

 Fifteen dollars ; (iii) providing for a Commutation of the Annual Dues 

 by the payment at one time of Two hundred dollars ; (iv) restricting 

 elections to the Stated Meetings in January and May ; (v) providing 

 that the Annual Report of the Treasurer shall be submitted in print ; 

 (vi) establishing the date when the financial year of the Acad- 

 emy shall begin ; (vii) reducing the time in which delinquents may 

 pay their Annual Dues from two years to six months ; and (viii) the 

 incorporation of some Standing Votes with those Chapters of the Stat- 

 utes to which they pertain and in which they appear to your Com- 

 mittee to be more appropriately placed. 



The new machinery for the nomination and election of Fellows and 

 Foreign Honorary Members, if adopted by the Academy, cannot fail to 

 result in a closer scrutiny by the Class Committees of the names pro- 

 posed, and a more careful and discriminating selection by the Council 

 of those presented to the Academy for its consideration. 



Conciseness, concentration, comprehensiveness, and conformity were 

 the principal objects aimed at by your Committee in redraughting the 

 Code. Except in one or two unavoidable instances, no provision of 

 the Statutes affecting more than one officer, committee, or subject has 

 been repeated, such provisions being clearly indicated under their ap- 

 propriate secondary headings by cross-references to the Chapter and 

 Article where the text of the provision is printed. 



Your Committee has given careful consideration to proposals for 

 rotation in office applying to the eight Officers and the Standing 

 Committees annually elected by the Academy, and for an increase in 

 the number of members of some of the other Committees ; but it is 

 unanimously of opinion that the adoption of these propositions would 

 not be Avise. Experience gained by long, continuous service on such a 

 committee, for instance, as that which administers the Rumford Fund, 

 is valuable to the Academy ; while for such service as is expected from 

 those committees which it was proposed to enlarge, small bodies are 

 generally more efficient than large ones. 



