16 REPORT OF THE SECRETARY. 



satisfactory exhibit was prepared, illustrating every phase of the 

 activities of the Institution and its bureaus, especially the National 

 Museum. A detailed description will be printed in the Museum Eeport 

 for 1896. 



Zoological congress. — Dr. Charles W. Stiles, honorary curator in the 

 National Museum, was nominated by me, and appointed by the Secre- 

 tary of State, as United States representative at the International 

 Zoological Congress at Leyden, Holland, in September, 1895, and Dr. 

 Herbert Haviland Field was appointed as a second delegate to the same 

 congress. Dr. Stiles reports that 232 members attended the congress, 

 representing 22 nationalities. The business of greatest international 

 importance accomplished was the adoption of resolutions (1) establish- 

 ing a central bureau of bibliography for zoology, (2) appointing an 

 international commission upon the code of nomenclature, and (3) in 

 favor of the repeal of the section of the present international postal 

 laws which prohibits the sending of "animals living or dead" through 

 the international mails. Committees were appointed in accordance 

 with the provisions of these resolutions. 



The Smithson Memorial tablets. — The bronze tablets mentioned in my 

 last report have been completed and will be placed on Smithson's tomb 

 and in the English church at Genoa, in memory of the founder of the 

 Smithsonian Institution. The tablets, which measure 40 by 28 inches, 

 were designed by Mr. William Ordway Partridge, of New York City. 

 They bear a portrait of James Smithson, surrounded by a wreath and 

 on either side a torch, and beneath is the legend "James Smithson, F. 

 E. S., founder of the Smithsonian Institution, Washington; erected by 

 the Eegents of the Institution, 1896." The accompanying illustration 

 of the tablets is from a photograph of the plaster model. 



American Historical Association. — The annual report of the American 

 Historical Association for the year 1895 was transmitted to Congress 

 through the Secretary of the Institution, in accordance with the act of 

 incorporation of the association. These reports are Congressional docu- 

 ments, and the Institution has had no control of their distribution. 



NATIONAL MUSEUM. 



The museum of the Smithsonian Institution, which was formed in 

 part and for a time entirely maintained at the expense of the Smithson 

 fund, was the nucleus of the present National Museum, to which the 

 Eegents have continued to contribute matter especially under their 

 charge, so that the Institution has in it a large pecuniary interest, and 

 has always maintained with it, on account of this history and owner- 

 ship, relationships of a more intimate kind than with some bureaus 

 which have not been at one time a part of itself. 



Ever since 1858 Congress has appropriated money for the mainte- 

 nance of the Museum, but it has scarcely made any special appropriation 

 for the improvement of the collections by purchase, so that in respect 



