182 BOARD OF REGENTS. 



which escaped him in his last hour were the expressions of the real sentiments of his 

 inner life. 



Observant of the causes which have led to our present civil war he ever strove by 

 adjustment to avoid their disastrous effects. " I know not," said he, " what our des- 

 tiny may be, but I try to keep up with the spirit of the age, to keep in view the his- 

 tory of the country, to see what we have done, whither we are going, and with what 

 velocity we are moving, in order to be prepared for those events which it is not in the 

 power of man to thwart." 



Placed at the head of the Territorial Committee of the Senate, it was under his 

 direction that Territory after Territory and State after State were admitted into the 

 Union. The comprehensiveness of his views was exhibited in his great speech on the 

 Clayton and Bulwer treaty, on the 4th of March, 1853, wherein he enforced a conti- 

 nental policy and refused to prescribe limits to the area over which the principles of 

 our Government might safely be extended. 



His position on the Committee of Foreign Kelations gave him a breadth of view in 

 regard to our relations with other countries, which was enlarged by personal obser- 

 vation in foreign travel, and in special historic research. His knowledge on this sub- 

 ject was conscientiously applied in the way which he deemed best fitted to advance 

 the commercial and financial interests of our whole country. 



He died in the midst of the people of a district where he had been cherished and 

 honored during the whole of his public life ; in a city whose commercial and material 

 improvement was the pride of his heart, and a type of his own character. The matu- 

 rity of his growth, the fertility of his resources, and his sturdy energy, rendered his 

 life a microcosm of the great section of our country with which he was so closely 

 identified. We may toll the slow bell for his departed spirit, we may drape ourselves 

 in the emblems of grief; but if his friends and admirers would truly honor his mem- 

 ory, they will endeavor, like him in his last days, to moderate the heat of party strife, 

 enlarge their views of political science, and emulate his growth in moral character 

 and clear-sighted patriotism. 



The Secretary stated that during a recent visit of Rev. Francis 

 Vinton to Washington he had obtained from him some additional 

 facts relative to the Wynns estate, of which the Smithsonian Insti- 

 tution is the provisional legatee. 



Mr: Thomas Wynns, born in North Carolina, resided for a long- 

 time at Grand Turk, Turk's Island, where he accumulated a con- 

 siderable fortune, and married at an advanced age Charlotte Arthur, 

 a daughter of John Arthur, a woman much younger than himself. 

 He afterwards removed to Brooklyn, New York, where he died 

 about 1851, leaving his widow and one child, a daughter. To the 

 former he bequeathed a life annuity of $1,500, and to the latter his 

 whole estate, subject to the foregoing annuity. In case of the 

 death of this daughter without issue, the estate, now valued at 

 from $60,000 to $70,000, is bequeathed to the Smithsonian Institu- 

 tion. The property is securely invested in bonds and mortgages, 

 and is under the care of Edw. Coffin, now residing in London, and 

 Rev. Francis Vinton, of Trinity Church, New York, as trustees. 

 The accounts are rendered to the surrogate of Kings county, New 

 York. 



After the death of her husband, Mrs. Wynns returned to the 

 West Indies and married Captain Anderson. She now resides 

 with her daughter, Charlotte Arthur Wynns, in England. The 

 latter is about seventeen years of age. 



