236 SPENCER FULLERTON BAIRD 
tant part of the work which he was called on to undertake 
was the Smithsonian International Exchanges which he 
went into with his usual energy. 
“In the earlier years when the employes of the Smith- 
sonian were few, it was necessary for him not only to 
carry on the arranging and supervision of this work, but 
to do a large part of the manual labor with his own hands. 
When the actual putting up of the packages for foreign 
countries was in order he usually impressed into the ser- 
vice any of his friends who might be in the neighborhood 
and at leisure; and it is rather amusing to note in his 
journal who some of the people were whom he set to 
work at this task. I imagine that very few people are 
now living who remember the enormous labor and anxious 
care which laid the foundations of the National Museum, 
including as it did his own collections, those of the Wilkes 
Exploring Expedition and the collections of the former 
National Institute. 
“My father was interested primarily, of course, in 
seeing that among the explorers sent out by any Govern- 
4 This function of the Institution, suggested by Professor Henry 
and organized by Baird, was the result of an arrangement with foreign 
governments by which boxes of pamphlets and books sent by scientific 
men or institutions as a gift to colleagues or societies of both sides 
of the Atlantic, under the auspices of the Smithsonian or its approved 
agents, were passed through Custom Houses without being opened 
and on arriving at their destination were distributed by the recipients 
to the people or organizations for whom they were intended. This 
work was done without charge by the Smithsonian and for some 
years the transatlantic steamship companies carried the freight at a 
much reduced rate. In later years the distribution of Government 
documents on a large scale was added to the function of the Exchanges 
and it is now regularly appropriated for by Congress as a separate 
bureau under the direction of the Institution. 
