530 
FOURTH BULLETIN OF 
[ 1846 . 
1 Tufted Duck, Fuligula rufitorques. 
1 Golden Eye, Fuligula elongula. 
1 Long-tailed Duck, Fuligula glacialis. 
1 Hooded merganser, Mergus cucullatus. 
1 Black-bellied Darter, Plotus atringa. 
1 Horned Grebe, Podiceps cornutus. 
1 Great Northern Diver or Loon, (young,) Colymbus glacialis. 
1 Black-throated Diver, (young,) Colymbus areticus. 
1 Red-throated Diver, (young,) Colymbus septentrionalis. 
1 Black Guillemot, Uria grylle. 
1 Do. do. (young,) described as Uria marmoruta, (Viellot.) 
LETTER FROM Mr. ROOT, OF MOBILE, ON THE SUBJECT OF 
AMERICAN SILK. 
Mobile, June 20, 1846. 
Sir : I received though your kindness twelve seeds of the silk plant, and am 
happy in saying that I have succeeded in growing six plants. They are now five 
feet high and in bloom. The plant seems hardy, and is unlike any thing I have 
met with in our country. The main stem and branches are somewhat like the 
senna of this region, but the foliage bears no resemblance. J. S. Skinner, esq., 
editor of the Farmer’s Library, saw the plant growing in April, and thought the 
experiment a very fair one. The seeds were planted in January in pots and 
slightly forced under glass, and transplanted in P*lay in dry sandy ground, six feet 
apart. 
I shall not fail to send you a portion of the seeds and the silk when at maturity. 
Very respectfully, your obedient servant, 
CHESTER ROOT. 
Francis Markoe, Jr., Esq., 
Corresponding Secretary of the National Institute , Washington. 
LETTER FROM HON. RICHARD RUSH, OF PENNSYLVANIA, ON 
THE SUBJECT OF THE NATIONAL INSTITUTE. 
Sydenham, near Philadelphia, July 18, 1846. 
Dear Sir: ’Permit me to send you for the National Institute an old folio volume 
containing bound-up numbers of “The New York Mercury” and “New York 
Gazette and Weekly Mercury,” from 1758 to 1768, the numbers being pretty 
full for some of the years, though scanty or deficient for others. From its pages 
may be gleaned items of information not without interest concerning portions of 
our political history before the Revolution, intermingled with little matters illus¬ 
trative of habits, manners, and usages in New York and others of the old thirteen 
States at that colonial day. It is sent in the hope that the Institute will do me the 
honor to accept it as a slight token of the continued interest I take in its welfare, 
and of the undiminished gratification I derive from being continued on the list of 
its corresponding members. 
In acknowledging your favor of the 8th instant, conveying a copy of the memo¬ 
rial presented by the Institute to Congress on the 16th of December, I cannot avoid 
some little expression of the deep regret I feel at the pecuniary embarrassments 
under which the Institute labors. Had these been brought on by imprudence— 
had the members or officers been seeking emoluments or pecuniary advantages in 
any conceivable way for themselves—or had there been any extravagance or waste 
in managing the concerns of the body, relief could little be expected from the 
hand of Government. But when nothing of this kind is the case—when all have 
