REPORT 
OF THE 
SECRETARY OF THE SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION. 
CHARLES D. WALCOTT, 
FOR THE YEAR ENDING JUNE 30, 1909. 
To the Board of Regents of the Smithsonian Institution: 
GENTLEMEN: I have the honor to submit a report showing the oper- 
ations of the Institution during the year ending June 30, 1909, 
including the work placed under its direction by Congress in the 
United States National Museum, the Bureau of American Ethnology, 
the International Exchanges, the National Zoological Park, the 
Astrophysical Observatory, and the regional bureau of the Inter- 
national Catalogue of Scientific Literature. 
In the body of this report there is given a general account of the 
affairs of the Institution, while the appendix presents more detailed 
statements by those in direct charge of the different branches of the 
work. Independently of this the operations of the National Museum 
and of the Bureau of American Ethnology are fully treated in 
separate volumes. 
THE SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION. 
THE ESTABLISHMENT. 
By act of Congress approved August 10, 1846, the Smithsonian 
Institution was created an establishment. Its statutory members are 
“the President, the Vice-President, the Chief Justice, and the heads 
of the executive departments.” 
THE BOARD OF REGENTS. 
The Board of Regents consists of the Vice-President and the Chief 
Justice of the United States as ex officio members, three members of 
the Senate, three Members of the House of Representatives, and six 
citizens, “two of whom shall be resident in the city of Washington, 
and the other four shall be inhabitants of some State, but no two 
of them of the same State.” 
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