582 CONGKESSIONAL PROCEEDINGS. 



and longitudes, heights, etc. These instruments are lent or furnished 

 by the Smithsonian Institution, and the results obtained with them 

 become public property. Means are furnished. to explorers to make 

 collections of minerals and ores; of plants and animals; of iishes, rep- 

 tiles, and insects; and to provide for their transportation from the 

 field. These collections are submitted to the most successful culti- 

 vators of the branches of science to which they belong; to men who 

 have made these objects their especial study, and their investigations 

 are made public. The specimens are returned to the Smithsonian 

 collections to be taken care of, and perhaps to be reexamined at some 

 more advanced period. By these and similar modes research is stim- 

 ulated. The provision of meteorological instruments and of instruc- 

 tions for their use, the collections of the observations made and their 

 comparisons, have already furnished most important information in 

 regard to the climate and storms of the United States, and the full 

 publication of the results will enable men of science of this and other 

 countries to draw from these materials most valuable inferences and 

 laws. 



2. To diffuse knowledge, by the publication of the contributions, 

 from researches and explorations, of reports on treatises on different 

 subjects or branches of science and its application, of reports showing 

 the history and progress of these subjects or branches is the second 

 object of the "active operations." These publications diffuse among 

 men the knowledge obtained by the agency of the Institution or from 

 without. The subjects which have been already embraced in the 

 Smithsonian Contributions and in the different volumes of reports, 

 etc., have been numerous and well distributed among the various 

 branches of knowledge — the abstract and the practical. The publi- 

 cations are widely scattered among the institutions of this and of 

 other countries, given to them or exchanged for their proceedings, 

 transactions, or other publications, and accessible at moderate rates 

 to individuals. Of the impression made abroad by the Smithsonian 

 Contributions to Knowledge the learned professor of Greek of Har- 

 vard University [C. C. Felton] thus speaks: 



Cambridge, Massachusetts, June 30^ 1854- 

 I have but recently returned from Europe, and I now desire to acknowledge the 

 service you did me by your circular letter of introduction to the librarians of the 

 European establishments which are in correspondence with the Smithsonian Insti- 

 tution. Wherever I presented it I was received with great kindness and attention, 

 and had the opportunity of seeing whatever was curious, interesting, and valuable 

 in the libraries and collections. 



It gave me pleasure to notice the high estimation in which the Smithsonian Insti- 

 tution, under its present management, is held everywhere in Europe. The volumes 

 pul)lished under its auspices have done the highest honor to American science, and 

 are considered most valuable contributions to the stock of knowledge among men. 

 They are shown to visitors as among the most creditable publications of the age, and 

 as highly interesting illustrations of the progress of science and the arts m the 



