32 SMITHSONIAN BEQUEST. 



I can not wonder that the solicitors deemed it unnecessary to detail to 

 me the "arguments" by which Monsieur de la Batut sought to sup- 

 port these, his "requisitions." His attempt at coercion, by withhold- 

 ing evidence within his power, unless on a previous pledge from me 

 to support his requisitions, thereby showing a disposition to prevent 

 the United States recovering anything, will probably gain him little 

 favor in their eyes. Fortunately there is now other evidence, as the 

 solicitors state in their letter, and have since told me verbally, which, 

 it is believed, will place the United States beyond his reach. The 

 part of their letter that I read with regret was that in which they inti- 

 mated to him that, as neither they nor I could engage that anything 

 should be done for him by the United States, he must himself apply 

 to the proper authorities. I called upon them immediately, to express 

 my wish that no such encouragement be in future held out to him; but 

 it seems that he had already taken his course; their letter of the 22d 

 instant gives me to understand that he proposes to address a memorial 

 to the President through the auspices of Mr. Drummond, the defend- 

 ant in the suit. That he would have done so on his own motion in the 

 end, without any hint from the solicitors, is probable enough; but I 

 was sorry it had been given to him. For myself, I have invariably 

 discountenanced all his pretensions, deeming it my duty to do so most 

 unequivocally. I have refused to see him, unless in presence of the 

 solicitors, lest he should misunderstand, or forget, or pervert what I 

 might say; and the latter told me they could perceive no advantage in 

 my seeing him. If the United States recover the legacy bequeathed 

 by Mr. Smithson, I should naturally regard the whole of it as a trust 

 fund in their hands, not to be in any wise diminished or touched but by 

 the same legislative power that accepted it for the purposes specially 

 set forth in the act of Congress of the 1st of July, 1836. Not only, 

 therefore, do I disclaim all authority for yielding in the slightest 

 degree to Monsieur la Batut's demands or giving him the least hope 

 that any of them are ultimately to be allowed by the United States, 

 but I should have thought it not justifiable in me to refer him to the 

 President. 



Not being sure that I rightly understood what the solicitors mean 

 in their letter of the 9th about an alteration in the law ? I sought an 

 explanation from them. It appears that by an act of Parliament, 

 passed in 1834, whenever a person entitled to the annual proceeds of 

 any fund or property for his life, under a will coming into operation 

 after the passing of the act, dies between the points of time assigned 

 for the periodical payments, his representatives become entitled to a 

 proportionate part of the accruing proceeds up to the day of his 

 death. Before this act there was no such apportionment; and as Mr. 

 Smithson's will came into operation before it was passed, Hungerford's 

 representatives have no claim to any of the dividend that accrued after 

 Ihe last dividend day that happened previously to his decease. I 



