h are
just received--too late to read them and to make recommendations
thereon--and are herewith submitted.

The international exhibition held in Philadelphia this year, in
commemoration of the one hundredth anniversary of American independence,
has proven a great success, and will, no doubt, be of enduring advantage
to the country. It has shown the great progress in the arts, sciences,
and mechanical skill made in a single century, and demonstrated that we
are but little behind older nations in any one branch, while in some we
scarcely have a rival. It has served, too, not only to bring peoples and
products of skill and labor from all parts of the world together, but in
bringing together people from all sections of our own country, which
must prove a great benefit in the information imparted and pride of
country engendered.

It has been suggested by scientists interested in and connected with
the Smithsonian Institution, in a communication herewith, that the
Government exhibit be removed to the capital and a suitable building
be erected or purchased for its accommodation as a permanent exhibit.
I earnestly recommend this; and believing that Congress would second
this view, I directed that all Government exhibits at the Centennial
Exhibition should remain where they are, except such as might be injured
by remaining in a building not intended as a protection in inclement
weather, or such as may be wanted by the Department furnishing them,
until the question of permanent exhibition is acted on.

Although the moneys appropriated by Congress to enable the participation
of the several Executive Departments in the International Exhibition
of 1876 were not sufficient to carry out the undertaking to the full
extent at first contemplated, it gives me pleasure to refer to the
very efficient and creditable manner in which the board appointed from
these several Departments to provide an exhibition on the part of the
Government have discharged their duties with the funds placed at their
command. Without a precedent to guide them in the preparation of such a
display, the success of their labors was amply attested by the sustained
attention which the contents of the Government building attracted during
the period of the exhibition from both foreign and native visitors.

I am strongly impressed with the value of the collection made by the
Government for the purposes of the exhibition, illustrating, as it does,
the mineral resources