192 The Smithsonian Institution 



dollars and a half, while no other museum building has cost 

 less than eleven dollars for the same unit. It was regarded 

 by Professor Baird as a temporary structure, and he acted 

 upon the theory, which experience has shown to be a wise 

 one, that in order to secure for the future a museum worthy 

 of the nation, the first necessity was a building of great ca- 

 pacity, in which the extraordinary opportunities at that time 

 presented for accumulating and organizing great collections 

 could be utilized. 



The larger portion of his time was still occupied by his 

 duties as Commissioner of Fisheries, yet the Institution and 

 its dependencies were constantly in his mind, and the ten 

 years of his incumbency were marked by an extraordinary 

 expansion in every direction of the Institution's potentiality 

 for the future. 



Honors were showered upon him from every quarter of 

 the world. The King of Norway and Sweden, in 1875, made 

 him a Knight of the Order of St. Olaf; in 1878 he received 

 the medal of the Acclimatization Society of Melbourne ; in 

 1879 the gold medal of the Societe d'Acclimatation de France. 



He was an honorary member of many scientific societies in 

 England, Germany, Austria, Spain, the Netherlands, Austra- 

 lia, New Zealand, Holland, Switzerland, Canada, and the 

 United States. Even Japan was not unmindful of his services 

 to science, and from distant Yezo came soon after his death 

 a little volume printed on silk containing his portrait and an 

 appreciation in Japanese. 



A few months before his death, at the 250th anniversary 

 of Harvard University, he received the degree of LL. D. 

 This was one of the few occasions upon which he was ever 

 induced to ascend the platform in a public place. 



The village of Baird, in Shasta County, California, was 

 named for him in 1877. 



