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On comparing this statement with that made last January, it appears that the total amount of the fund has been increased during the year $6,683.31, viz:

By the Hamilton bequest.....

By the increased value of Virginia stock ...
By balance of unexpended annual income

$1,000 00 2, 000 00

3, 683 31

$6,683 31

The Board of Regents and the Secretary will in future be relieved of all anxiety as to the safety of the semi-annual interest by the arrangement which has been made with the United States Treasurer to receive it as a deposit, and to make payments from it on checks of the Secre tary, in the same manner as has been done heretofore in the First Na tional Bank.

The Institution is indebted to General Spinner for his prompt acquiescence in the proposition and for immediately carrying it out in all the details necessary to facilitate its operation.

Congress, at its last session, made an appropriation of $20,000 for the care and preservation of the specimens in the museum, and $10,000 for fitting up apartments in which the specimens are exhibited.

The uncollected coupons on the Virginia bonds held by the Institu tion were sold on the 9th of May, 1874, by Riggs & Co., with the fol lowing result:

$1,200 Virginia coupons at 773..

$2,322 Virginia coupons at 77

Less charges.....

$925 50 1, 787 94

2, 713 44

17 61

$2,695 83

This amount was deposited with the Treasurer of the United States to the credit of the account of the current expenses of the Institution for the year.

PUBLICATIONS.

Since the reports of the Institution are separately distributed to many persons who have not ready access to the whole series, it is necessary in each succeeding one to repeat certain facts which may serve to give an idea of the general organization of the establishment. The following statement is therefore repeated:

The publications of the Institution are of three classes, viz, the CONTRIBUTIONS to KNOWLEDGE, the MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS, and the ANNUAL REPORTS. The first consist of memoirs containing positive additions to science resting on original research, and which are generally the result of investigations to which the Institution has, in some

way, rendered assistance. The Miscellaneous Collections are composed of works intended to facilitate the study of branches of natural history, meteorology, &c., and are designed especially to induce individuals to engage in these studies as specialties. The Annual Reports, besides an account of the operations, expenditures, and condition of the Institu tion, contain translations from works not generally accessible to American students, reports of lectures, extracts from correspondence, &c. The following are the rules which have been adopted for the distribution of the several publications of the Institution:

1st. They are presented to learned societies of the first class which in return give complete series of their publications to the Institution.

2d. To libraries of the first class which give in exchange their cata logues and other publications, or an equivalent from their duplicate volumes.

3d. To colleges of the first class which furnish catalogues of their libraries and of their students, and all other publications relative to their organization and history.

4th. To States and Territories, provided they give in return copies of all documents published under their authority.

5th. To public libraries in this country, containing 15,000 volumes, especially if no other copies are given in the same place; and to smaller libraries where a large district would be otherwise unsupplied.

6th. To institutions devoted exclusively to the promotion of particu lar branches of knowledge are given such Smithsonian publications as relate to their respective objects.

7th. The Annual Reports are presented to the meteorological ob servers, to contributors of valuable material to the library or collections, and to persons engaged in special scientific research.

The distribution of the publications of the Institution is a matter which requires much care and judicious selection, the great object being to make known to the world the truths which may result from the expenditure of the Smithson fund. For this purpose the principal class of publications, namely, the Contributions, must be so distributed as to be accessible to the greatest number of readers, and this will evidently be to large central libraries.

The volumes of Contributions are presented on the express condition that, while they are carefully preserved, they shall be accessible at all times to students and others who may desire to consult them, and be returned to the Institution in case the establishments to which they are presented at any time cease to exist. These works, it must be recollected, are not of a popular character, but require profound study to fully understand them; they are, however, of importance to the professional teacher and the popular expounder of science. They contain materials from which general treatises on special subjects may be elaborated.

Full sets of the publications cannot be given to all who apply for them, since this is impossible with the limited income of the Institution; and, indeed, if care be not exercised in the distribution, so large a portion of the income would be annually expended on the production of copies for distribution of what has already been published, that nothing further could be done in the way of new publications. It must be recollected that every addition to the list of distribution not only involves the giving of publications that have already been made, but also those which are to be made hereafter.

At the commencement of the operations of the Institution the publications were not stereotyped, and consequently the earlier volumes have now become scarce, especially the first, of which there are now no copies for distribution, although it can occasionally be obtained at a secondhand book-store in one of the larger cities.

No copyright has ever been secured on any of the publications of the Institution. They are left free to be used by compilers of books, with the understanding, however, that full credit will be given to the name of Smithson for any extracts which may be made from them. This condition is especially insisted on, because the credit thus required is important as evidence to the world of the proper management of the Smithson fund. In many cases credit is given merely to the author without mentioning the name of the Institution; this is not just, since, as a general rule, the income of the establishment is applied not only to the publication of the article but also to assist in its production.

Publications in 1874.-During the past year the nineteenth volume of the quarto series of the Smithsonian Contributions to Knowledge has been published. It contains the following papers:

1. Problems of Rotary Motion presented by the Gyroscope, the Precession of the Equinoxes, and the Pendulum. By Brevet Maj. Gen. J. G. Barnard. 4to., pp. 74.

2. A Contribution to the History of the Fresh-Water Algæ of North America. By Horatio C. Wood, jr., M. D., professor of botany and clinical lecturer on diseases of the nervous system in the University of Pennsylvania. 4to., pp. 274, 21 colored plates.

3. An Investigation of the Orbit of Uranus, with General Tables on its Motion. By Simon Newcomb, professor of mathematics, United States Navy. 4to., pp. 296.

This volume, of which the several memoirs have been described in previous reports, will not only sustain, but increase the reputation of the Institution for its contributions to the science of the day. The memoirs which it contains have been received with manifest interest by the scientific world, and recognized as positive additions to knowledge resting on original investigation.

Besides the nineteenth volume of the Contributions to Knowledge, the eleventh and twelfth volumes of Miscellaneous Collections have been published during the year.

The eleventh volume of Miscellaneous Collections consists of 789 octavo pages, and contains the following articles:

1. Arrangement of the Families of Mammals, with Analytical Tables. Prepared for the Smithsonian Institution by Theodore Gill, M. D., Ph. D., pp. 104.

2. Arrangement of the Families of Fishes, or classes Pisces, Marsipobranchii, and Leptocardii. Prepared for the Smithsonian Institution by Theodore Gill, M. D., Ph. D., pp. 96.

3. Monographs of the Diptera of North America; Part III, Ortalida Family. Prepared for the Smithsonian Institution by H. Loew; four plates, pp. 376.

4. Directions for collecting and preserving Insects. Prepared for the use of the Smithsonian Institution by A. S. Packard, jr., M. D., pp. 60. 5. New Species of North American Coleoptera. Prepared for the Smithsonian Institution by John L. LeConte, M. D.; Part II, pp. 74. 6. Classification of the Coleoptera of North America. Prepared for the Smithsonian Institution by John L. LeConte, M. D., pp. 72.

The twelfth volume of Miscellaneous Collections consists of 767 octavo pages, and contains the following articles:

1. Review of American Birds, in the Museum of the Smithsonian Institution; Part I. By S. F. Baird, 1864-1872, pp. 484. 2. The Constants of Nature; Part I. Melting Points; and Chemical Formulæ. Clarke, S. B. December, 1873, pp. 272.

Specific Gravities; Boiling and
Compiled by F. Wigglesworth

3. Rules for the Telegraphic Announcements of Astronomical Discoveries. By Prof. Joseph Henry. April, 1873, pp. 4.

Since the publication of the 19th volume of Smithsonian Contributions, a memoir, of 32 quarto pages, has been printed and distributed, which will form part of the 20th volume. This is by Prof. S. Newcomb, of the National Observatory, Washington, on the "General Integrals of Planetary Motion"-an abstruse mathematical work, of which the nature is indicated in its title. It gives a series of suggestions and new investigations relative to the methods of determining the motions of celestial bodies as affected by interplanetary perturbations. It is in part an extension and generalization of two former papers by the same author, the first published in Liouville's Journal, vol. XVI, 1871, and the second in the Comptes-Rendus, vol. LXXV. It was submitted to Prof. H. A. Newton, of Yale College, and Mr. G. W. Hill, of Nyack, N. Y., for critical examination, and received their unqualified approval for publication in the Smithsonian Contributions to Knowledge.

Another paper, intended for the twentieth volume of Contributions, which has been printed and distributed during the past year, is by James G. Swan, on the Haidah Indians of Queen Charlotte Islands. It consists of 18 quarto pages, and is illustrated with five plain and two colored plates, to represent the carved posts or pillars raised in front of the houses of the chiefs, and various tattoo designs copied from the

bodies of the Indians. This paper was described in the last report. It may, however, be here mentioned that it is of special interest in connec tion with the large number of ethnological specimens received during the past year from the northwest coast.

Another work published during the year is the third of the Tonerlecture series. It is by Dr. J. M. DaCosta, of Philadelphia, on the strain and over-action of the heart, and forms 32 octavo pages, illustrated by two wood-cuts. These lectures, as has been stated in previous reports, have been instituted at Washington by Dr. Joseph M. Toner, and are confined to such memoirs or essays relative to medical science as contain some new truth fully established by experiment or observation. It is proper to remark that of this course of lectures only two have been published, the first and the third, the author having not yet furnished the manu script of the second. To defray, in part at least, the cost of printing these lectures, it has been thought advisable to charge for them 25 cents a copy to individuals who have no special claim on the Institution by having contributed meteorological observations or additions to the collections.

Another work printed during the year is a list of the publications of the Institution to July, 1874, exhibiting 297 distinct articles, arranged first numerically, and secondly in regard to the subjects as given in the titles. It forms an octavo of 26 pages. An edition of 2,500 copies of this work was furnished to the " Publishers' Trade-List Annual" for 1874, (New York, October, 1874,) and through this medium the list of publications of the Institution will become known to all booksellers and librarians in the United States.

An edition of 250 copies of tables selected from the volume of Physi cal and Meteorological Tables, prepared and published some years since at the expense of the Institution, has been printed for the use of the Argentine Meteorological Observatory at Cordoba, under the direction of our distinguished countryman, Dr. B. A. Gould.

Publications in the press: 1. The Antiquities of Tennessee, by Dr. Joseph Jones, of which an account was given in the last report. Of this the wood-cuts have been prepared, and it is expected that the printing will be finished in the course of the present year.

2. A Memoir on the Harmonies of the Solar System, by Prof. Stephen Alexander, of the College of New Jersey.

In this communication the author divides his subject into three sections. Section I begins with the statement that Kepler's third law is ordinarily expressed by saying that the squares of the periodic times of the sev eral planets of the solar system are to one another, respectively, as the cubes of their distances from the sun; but from this we do not learn that there are any laws determining the ratios of the distances themselves, and it is one of the main objects of the present discussion to show that such laws exist, and precisely what they are; generality and precision being characteristics of every law of nature.

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