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G2 HAND-BOOK OF WASHINGTON. THE SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION. This Institution was founded upon a bequest of more than half a million of dollars, made to the United States by an Englishman named James Smithson, a man of good family, and of sufficient learning to have published in the Transactions of the Royal Society and other Journals no less than twenty-four scientific treatises, the majority of which were on Mineral Chemistry. The object of the bequest, according to his will, was “To found at Washington, under the name of the Smithsonian Institution, an Establishment for the increase and diffusion of knowledge among men.” On the 1st of July, 1836, Congress solemnly accepted this important trust, and the money was paid into the Treasury of the United States in 1838. The Act of Congress establishing the Institution as it now exists, was passed in 1846. By this Act, the President, Vice President, all the Members of the Cabinet, the Chief Justice, the Commissioner of the Patent Office and the Mayor of Washington, during the time for which they should hold their offices, were made the per sonnel of the Institution; and they are to be assisted by a Board of Regents, who were to bo