116 , 
neers, an officer whose experience, energy, boldness, and 
self-reliance eminently fitted him for the task. It is for 
him to recount the history of the work, to give to the 
world the interesting narrative of difficulties met and over- 
come, of patience requited and energy triumphant. Gen- 
eral Totten watched its progress with unflagging interest, 
making frequent visits to the superintending engineer, aid- 
ing him with his counsels and encouraging him in his dif- 
ficulties. He lived to enjoy the proud satisfaction of in- 
specting the finished structure; and when at last from its 
towering summit flashed o’er the troubled waters the beacon- 
light of safety to the tempest-tossed mariner, he might well 
exclaim, with the Latin poet, though in a nobler sense and 
in a less boastful spirit, —“ Exegi monumentum ere peren- 
nius.” : 
General (then Colonel) Totten was named in the act of 
Congress organizing the Smithsonian Institution in 1846 as 
one of the Regents to whom the business transactions of that 
celebrated establishment are intrusted. At an early meeting 
of the Board of Regents he was appointed one of the Ex- 
ecutive Committee, and was continued in these offices by 
repeated election to the time of his death, a period of nearly 
eighteen years. He evinced a lively interest in the organiza- 
tion of the institution, and after a careful study of the will 
and character of Smithson, gave his preference to the pro 
gramme prepared by Professor Henry, which was finally 
adopted. His advocacy of the plan was the more important 
since he was well acquainted with the scientific character of 
James Smithson, and had himself, as we shall see in a sub- 
sequent statement, been engaged in a line of research similar 
to one of those pursued by the founder of this institution- 
In the reconstruction of the interior of the main part 
the Smithsonian building which had partly been completed 
