TEN YEARS OF THE CARNEGIE INSTITUTION
The tenth yearbook of the Carnegie Institution of Washington is of special interest, as it records a further gift from the founder of ten million dollars and reviews the history of the institution for its first ten years. The endowment is now $22,000,000 in five per cent, bonds of the steel corporation, worth at least $25,000,000. The investment in property of the institution from its income is about $1,700,000 and there is a reserve fund of $250,000. During the ten years the cost of administration has been $400,000, of publication $300,000, and the sum of $4,000,000 has been applied directly to research. There have been published 201 volumes under 156 different titles.
The Carnegie Institution has definitely adopted the policy of devoting its income to the support of its own departments rather than to attempting to conduct an emergency fund for research. Some minor grants and research associates are maintained, but these also are-semi-permanent in character, but few new special appropriations having been made recently. Last year about $500,000 was devoted to the ten departments of the institution.
The president states that the last fiscal year was the most fruitful on record for the ten specially organized departments of research. The solar observatory has now four telescopes—two tower telescopes, a horizontal 30-inch reflector and a 60-inch equatorial reflector. It has proved impossible to obtain a perfect cast for the 100-inch telescope, but the disc supplied by the French founders is being ground in the hope that the flaws will not interfere with its accuracy. The meridian determinations of stellar positions at the
