316 SPENCER FULLERTON BAIRD 
former from being the good wife of an ichthyologist, the latter as 
being handy with the quill. Well, I won’t make fun of your hand- 
writing, even if you have used the same quill without mending since 
you have been in Europe, and its nib getting broader and broader 
each day—for your letters are glorious and mirth-provoking, and 
soul-inspiring, and greatly refreshing, and it is not for my own intrinsic 
merit that I have been gifted by Providence by that wonderfully 
beautiful chirography which makes even my masters hang themselves 
for sheer envy. 
I wish you were here to talk over the thousand and one things 
which suggest themselves, and which can be so scantily represented 
inaletter. Every day brings something new. As to the Smithsonian, 
as Haldeman calls it, we are now in a state of uncertainty. I wrote 
you that a committee had been appointed to report whether the 
compromise should be abolished.!® This has not yet been reported, 
nor have I heard that it has been called together. They will probably 
give the thing a thorough overhauling, but their decision is uncertain. 
This Committee consists of Pearce, Totten, Mason, Maury, Choate. 
How they can report in favor of removing the restrictions in favor of 
the Library and Museum, with the plain law before them, I cannot 
see; matters Smithsonian are being talked about a good deal, and 
much opposition is manifested towards some of Prof. Henry’s views, 
but which side will carry the day “quien sabe.” In the present 
arrangement, the Library and Museum are to occupy jointly the 
large room of the lower story of the main building, while the new 
lecture room goes into the middle of the splendid room upstairs, 
cutting this up into one large apartment and a small no account one 
on each side. The present lecture room is to be converted into a 
house for Professor Henry, so that the only refuge for collections will 
be the single room aforesaid. The whole middle building will be 
finished in four or five months and we shall breathe freer with any 
additional accommodations. Our great lack will, however, be for 
office and work rooms. 
There is earnest talk of constructing a great iron crystal palace 
on the vacant square between the Smithsonian and the (Washington) 
Monument in which to place all the Government collections in Natural 
18'That is, whether more funds shall be allotted to the Library 
and less to the other functions of the Institution than at present. 
