SMITHSONIAN BEQUEST. 115 



of every description from the beginning to the end of the 

 suit, with some small extra charges, to which their letter 

 refers, which I also authorized, to ensure a speedy and suc- 

 cessful termination of the suit,) and considering the magni- 

 tude of the suit, was, in my judgment, and in that of others 

 better informed, to whom I submitted its amount, extremely 

 moderate. I hope it will be thought to show care on my 

 part to keep all those charges low, that often are run up to 

 amounts so enormous in English chancery proceedings; 

 and, let me add, as in justice I am bound to do, to show 

 more strongly that the solicitors I had to deal with were 

 honorable arid just men. 



I did not consider these refunded costs as belonging to 

 the legacy fund recovered, but I threw them into it when 

 the general gold was obtained, that all might be safely kept 

 together, and come under one insurance. 



The gross amount yielded by all the stock I sold, includ- 

 ing the 900 I received as the dividend on the consols, was 

 105,649 6s. 



For the prices at which I sold the different parcels and 

 kinds, I beg to refer to my Nos. 27 and 28, which detail 

 the commencement, progress, and conclusion of the sales. 

 This sum, added to the 725 3s. Id. received from the ac- 

 countant general of the court of chancery, and the 116 2s. 

 2d. returned to me by the solicitors, will show that the 

 entire sum that came into my hands was 106,490 11s. 9d. 



I am next to inform you of the expenses that attended 

 the sales of the stock, and shipping and bringing over the 

 gold to this country. 



After I had finally recovered the legacy from the court 

 of chancery, it did not seem to me prudent that I should, by 

 myself alone, undertake the sales of the stock awarded, 

 and delivered to me by its decree, any more than the ship- 

 ment of the gold, into which the money was afterwards to 

 be converted; these ulterior operations being usually con- 

 ducted through mercantile agencies, and being of a nature 

 not to be advantageously, if safely, conducted without them. 

 Feeling inadequate, in my own person merely, to the man- 

 agement of such operations, my first intention was that the 

 sales of the stock, as a highly important part of them, 

 should be put under the direction of some experienced mer- 

 cantile or banking-house in London, familiar with the modes 

 of doing business on its great stock exchange, and self-con- 

 fident in the measures to be taken. But I found that to 

 put this operation into such hands would incur acommision 

 of one per cent, on the entire fund, as mentioned in my No. 



