16 'ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1918. 



Institution, secretary of the committee; Dr. George P. Merrill, head 

 curator of geology, National Museum; and Dr. J. Walter Fewkes, 

 chief of the Bureau of American Ethnology, who succeeded Mr. F. W. 

 Hodge, resigned. 



LIBRARY. 



The library of the Smithsonian Institution is divided into (1) the 

 main library, consisting chiefly of journals and transactions of learned 

 societies and institutions throughout the world, which are in the cus- 

 tody of the Library of Congress and administered as the Smithsonian 

 deposit; (2) the National Museum library; (3) the library of the 

 Bureau of American Ethnology; (4) the National Zoological Park 

 library; (5) the library of the Astrophysical Observatory; and (6) 

 the office reference library. Some of these are subdivided into sev- 

 eral sectional libraries. 



The report of the assistant librarian in the appendix presents de- 

 tails of accessions. Mention should here be made of one exceptional 

 and important addition to the Museum library, consisting of a large 

 number of botanical and horticultural publications brought together 

 at Biltmore, N. C, by the late Mr. George W. Vanderbilt and pre- 

 sented by Mrs. Vanderbilt. 



NATIONAL MUSEUM. 



The detailed account of the operations of the National Museum is 

 recorded in an appendix to this report by Mr. Ravenel, the adminis- 

 trative assistant who had chiefly conducted the affairs for several 

 months during the illness of Assistant Secretary Rathbun, whose 

 death occurred shortly after the close of the fiscal year. It is there- 

 fore unnecessary here to do more than to review some of the prin- 

 cipal activities of the Museum and to refer to the appendix for fur- 

 ther information. 



The exhibits are now housed in three buildings: (1) the arts and 

 industries collection in what is known as the old Museum building, 

 (2) the natural history collections and the National Gallery of Art in 

 the large new building, and (3) the graphic arts and National Her- 

 barium in the original Smithsonian building. 



During the year 69,286 square feet of room in the Natural History 

 Building were turned over to the Secretary of the Treasury for use 

 of about 3,000 clerks of the War Risk Insurance Bureau. I may 

 mention here that a few weeks after June 30 the building was closed 

 to the public, the exhibition cases were crowded into the least pos- 

 sible quarters, and all available space was temporarily given over to 

 the Insurance Bureau. This course was gladly taken, in order to put 

 into immediate effect the financial assistance provided by Congress 

 for the families of our soldiers and sailors. 



