324 PROCEEDINGS OF THE BOARD OF REGENTS. 



EXTKACTS FROM THE GENERAL CORRESPONDENCE SUBMIT- 

 TED TO THE BOARD OF REGENTS. 



From tlie Records oftlie American Academy of Arts and Sciences. 



Boston, Massachusetts, Hay 29, 1866. 

 Remarks were made by the president and by the librarian on the aid ren- 

 dered by the Smithsonian Institution in effecting the exchanges of the academy; 

 and, on motion of the librarian, it was voted : That the thanks of the academy 

 be presented to the Smithsonian Institution for the generous and efficient aid 

 which it has rendered through its system of foreign exchanges and distribution 

 of publications, by which the academy has greatly profited. 



CHAUNCEY WRIGHT, 

 according Secretary American Academy. 



From George H. Knight. 



Cincinnati, Ohio, Jidy 10, 1866. 



The system of weights and measures being on the tapis, ought wo not to savo 

 posterity a world of trouble by once for all dethroning ten as the metrical num- 

 ber in favor of eight — a number susceptible of indefinite bisection, itself a cube, 

 (2 3 ,) and whose square is a cube, (4 3 ?) 



Two with its multiples is the natural division in measures ; witness the old dry 

 measure: 2 gills = one jack ; 2 jacks=one pint; 2 pints=one quart; 2 quarts= 

 one pottle; 2 pottles— one gallon ; 2 gallons=one peck; 4 pecks=one bushel; 

 8 bushels=one-quarter; 4 quarters=one chaldron, &c. 



The system would, of course, abolish the two digits, 8 and 9. Eight would 

 be represented by the sign 10, and nine by 11, while 8. X8. = 100. I am not 

 unaware of the prodigious labor involved in such a change — a labor too great 

 for an age which expends more on litigation than on its wheat crop ; but I never- 

 theless believe it will be undertaken by some future ago at a far greater sacrifice. 



From E. C. JBolles, Secretary of the Portland Society of Natural History. 



Portland, Maine, August 24, 1866. 



The Portland Society of Natural History has always felt that the Smithsonian 

 Institution was its best friend. Unnumbered instances of a generous regard, 

 rising to munificence in the time of our loss and trial ; wise counsels never out 

 of place ; wonderful facilities for scientific interchange most cheerfully granted, 

 all compel us to this belief; and it is in obedience to this conviction that we lay 

 before you, at the earliest possible moment, a statement of the present condition 

 of our society, which, in the terrible calamity well known throughout our land, 

 has been almost the greatest sufferer of all. 



The destructive fire of July 4th consumed our building and collections, leav- 

 ing, from the peculiar construction of the former, scarcely a vestige of the interior 

 of the hall. We regret to say that this loss was entirely unnecessary. The 

 structure was eminently fire-proof, separated by 20 feet on each side from the 

 buildings on the right and left. A large wooden house on the right had been 

 entirely burned without danger to our property ; the library had been quietly and 



