984 CONGRESSIONAL PKOOEEDINGB. 



Mr. IIawley. AVill the Senator let me state the reasons that led the 

 committee to make a favorable report and then interpose his objection? 



Mr. Plumb. Certainly. 



Mr. Hawley, The reports which the committee has recommended 

 to be printed were made by two officers of the Signal Bureau who 

 were sent to Alaska upon that service, but for certain scientific pur- 

 poses were placed under the orders and instructions of Professor Baird. 

 The first prejudice of the committee was against printing such things, 

 for it has happened before that when gentlemen, perhaps well qualified, 

 were stationed in similar places they busied themselves at odd hours 

 with scientific studies and made reports which they considered very 

 valuable and interesting, as perhaps they were, and then were very 

 ambitious to have the Government print then>. We were inclined at 

 first to put these reports into that general class, but I send to the desk 

 to have read a letter of Professor Baird concerning them. 



Smithsonian Institution, 

 Washington, D. C, January 16, 1886. 



Sir: I have the honor to acknowledge your letter of January 15, in reference to 

 the reports upon the natural history and ethnology of northwestern Alaska, made 

 by Messrs. E. W. Nelson and L. M. Turner, meteorological observers in that country 

 of the Signal Service. By the courtesy of the Signal Office the natural history labors 

 of these gentlemen were prosecuted under the direction of the Smithsonian Institu- 

 tion, which Jurnished instructions and the necessary material for the same, while the 

 reports of these gentlemen were prepared by the Smithsonian Institution, with the 

 assistance of the collaborators of the National Musemn. 



I am, therefore, quite ready to say that the results obtained are of exceptional 

 interest and value, as furnishing the only accurate and reliable information at our 

 command upon the vegetable, animal, and mineral resources of the region, the pro- 

 ductiveness and character of the soil, and other points of great practical interest in 

 connection with the future of that country. Detailed notes of observations of their 

 habits and life characteristics were secured by these gentlemen, with collections of 

 specimens in such great magnitude and vanety as to have made the National Museum 

 preeminent by their possession. 



The jiublication of these re^iorts is therefore extremely desirable, as representing 

 the only detailed and extended information at our command of a large region belong- 

 ing to the United States. 



Very respectfully, 



Spencer F. Baird. 

 Gen. W. B. Hazen, Cklef Signal Officer. 



May 14, 1886— Senate. 



Passed. 

 May 18, 1886— House. 



Received and referred. 

 June 23, 1886— House. 



Mr. John M, Farquhar, from the Committee on Printing, submit- 

 ted a report (H. 3060) to accompany Senate concurrent resolution 

 of January 20 : 



The Committee on Printing, to whom was referred the accompany- 

 ing Senate concurrent resolution, providing for printing the report on 



