Reports of Committees. 9 



inefficiency of an}'- springs for driving sewing machines and analogous 

 uses ; velocipedes as compared to other modes of locomotion ; portable 

 gas and apparatus for making it ; nickle plating and its advantages 

 over silver and any other known material ; sawing, especially by 

 chain saws ; enameled iron and its different degrees of strengtli and 

 flexibility ; and means for making the calcium light (ordinarily called 

 the Drummond light) permanent and efficient. 



Yonr committee congratulate the Institute on the high degree of 

 usefulness of this branch of its labors, and believe that there are few 

 channels in which its energies can be directed, which are more bene- 

 ficial to the community in general, or more interesting to those 

 immediately connected, than the Polytechnic Association of the 

 American Institute, as at present conducted. 

 Eespectfully submitted. 



THOMAS D. STETSON", 

 HAMILTON E. TOWLE, 

 CHAKLES E. EMERY, 

 WALTER SHRIVER, 



Committee. 

 New Yokk, February Zd, 1870. 



LIBRARY. 



The Committee on the Library, in again presenting their annual 

 report, congratulate the Institute on the large addition of very 

 valuable books, which they have been enabled to place on the shelves 

 of the library during the past year. Few libraries in the country, 

 we believe, possess a superior collection of valuable works on science 

 and art, furnishing no ordinary facilities for the study of those great 

 subjects to M'hich the lives of scientific men are devoted, studies which 

 promise such happy results to the human family. Every year is 

 producing new discoveries in science and art; and as it is the noble 

 end and design of the American Institute to aid and encourage the 

 advancements of scientific knowledge and study, the committee on 

 the librar}^ have been anxious to carry forward this great and noble 

 purpose, by procuring the most recent and valuable works published 

 in our own and in other lands on science and art. 



