10 REPORT GF THE SECRETARY. 
the most extensive and efficient which has ever been established in any 
country.” 
The service was immediately taken advantage of by the Bureaus of 
the United States Government, and between the years 1851 and 1867 
it is estimated that over 20,000 packages of Government publications 
were carried by the exchange service, at an estimated cost to the pri- 
vate funds of the Institution of over $8,000. 
In 1867 Congress recognized the efficiency and importance of this 
branch of the Smithsonian work by assigning toit the duty of exchang- 
ing fifty copies of all documents printed by order of either House of 
Congress, or by the United States Government Bureaus, for similar 
works published in foreign countries, and especially by foreign govern- 
ments. This at once absorbed a very considerable part of the funds 
which it was deemed expedient to devote to exchange purposes; for 
nearly thirteen years the burden of the expense being almost entirely 
borne by the Smithsonian fund. 
It is not necessary to repeat here the details of the exchange rela- 
tions with the Government, as they have been given at length in 
previous reports, but I beg to call attention briefly to the summary 
presented last year in these words : 
The following sums have been expended from the Smithsonian fund 
for the support of the international exchange system, in the interests 
and by the authority of the National Government, namely, $38,141.01 
in excess of appropriations advanced from January 1, 1868, to June 30, 
1886, for the exchange of official Government documents, and $7,034.81 
in excess of appropriations from July 1, 1886, to June 30, 1889, advanced 
for the purpose of carrying out a convention entered into by the United 
States, or an aggregate of $45,175.82. 
No account is here made of the rent value of the rooms occupied by 
the exchange bureau, though the rooms are urgently needed for the 
special purposes of the Institution. 
In accordance with a resolution of the Board of Regents, a memoran- 
dum setting forth the above facts was transmitted on the 20th of May, 
1890, to the Hon. Benjamin Butterworth, a member of the Board, in 
the House of Representatives, for the purpose of taking the necessary 
steps to procure a return by Congress to the Smithsonian fund of the 
sum last mentioned, namely, $45,175.82. 
The value of the exchange service having become widely known and 
appreciated, efforts were made by various countries to establish more 
formal international relations for the purpose of securing an increase in 
its benefits, and on the 15th of March, 1886, plenipotentiaries from the 
United States and various other nationalities signed a convention at 
Brussels by which their respective governments definitely assumed the 
exchange of official documents and of scientific and literary publica- 
tions between the countries interested. 
Referring now more ‘especially to the work of the exchange bureau 
during the past year and to its steady and rapid growth, it will be seen 
in the Appendix that no less than 100 tons of books passed through the 
