Letter from GEORGE PERKINS MARSH to SPENCER FULLERTON BAIRD, dated February 2, 1872.
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Dear Baird
Here are your letters of Feb 26 1870, May 21, 1870, May 31 1871, and Jany 9 1872, the latter a joint production of yourself and dear Mary, all unanswered. What a load of guilt! But my excuses are many, the best of all being: Well, I have not answered them.
But now, to begin at the end: I am much obliged to you for Gen. Parker's letter, which I sent off at once to Paolo Lioy, & his thanks shall [...] enrich Lucy' s collection of autographs. I can't congratulate you on your threatened obesity, suffering under the same evil myself. Banting avails little, unless carried to excess or accompanied with much exercise, & upon B's own bill of fare, I should soon outweigh the colossal Bohemian girl now on exhibition with a singing fish (tickets one cent,) in the Piazza Barberini just below us.
Glad to hear there are to be more books of birds, gladder still that you are going to
give chapter & verse in your reprint. I have, upon your bare promise, taken
off the interdict under which I had laid you, and you
are now free to eat and
drink like other men.
I was much graveled with that sentence about your "Fish commission being "prosecuted." I thought fish, being written with a big F, meant my master the Sec. of State, and was curious to know for what misdemeanor he was "prosecuted"
The photographs will be welcome, as is any thing from America, in this thirsty land, where my soul gaps for American books. Lucy shall have the photographs she wants, but let her remember that in general they will be only photog. from engravings, those directly from the pictures being scarce & generally worthless. My bookseller has ordered the Neapolitan Piscatory Report & hopes, in continuance of time, to receive it.
I shall be greatly delighted to receive Dr Hayden's photographs, cc. and the rather because the volumes he so kindly sent me last year, as well as, the Smithsonian Report sent by the Inst, was some how, as you will see by the letter to the S.I. herewith and never reached me. I should be glad to plunge the thief into one of those hot springs in that strange country.
Do not send through Ministries. There
may be abstractions. The best way, and a
bad one it is, is to send through the Desp. Agent with instructions to ship direct
to Leghorn or Civita Vecchia or by the Glasgow Mediterranean steamers, & not
through France. You cannot imagine the devilries & faithlessnesses of the
French transportation lines. Two or three months is short from Havre, & I
had a case sent from that port in October which has not arrived, nor ever will.
There are large French stamps, such as we Mandarins use on our letters for Lucy, with whom we should much enjoy that she speaks of.
We are in the midst of the fooleries, and most contemptible they are, of the Roman Carnival.
I shall be truly thankful when we come to sackcloth & ashes and get rid of some of the gaping idiots who come all the way from America to see such things, with which pious sentiment I close, wishing you all many good things, which the same does my wife.
Yours very trulyGeo P Marsh
Prof Baird
References in this letter:
Paolo Lioy (1836-1911) was an Italian naturalist and man of letters.
William Banting (1797-1878) was the author of Letter on Corpulence Addressed to the Public. First published by Harrison in London in 1863, there were several American editions.
In the 1860s Baird had became concerned about the decline of Atlantic fish populations. In a 1870 report to the House Committee on Appropriations he suggested the appointment of a Fish Commissioner to direct research into the problem. President Grant appointed Baird the first director of the newly formed U.S. Commission of Fish and Fisheries in 1871.
Hamilton Fish, 1808-1893, was born in New York. He was a New York Governor, U.S. Senator, and under Grant, was the Secretary of State. His greatest achievement was the settlement of the controversy with England over damages suffered by the North during the Civil War. The North felt the recognition of the South by England during the war prolonged the fighting. Named for the Confederate cruiser Alabama, equipped in British ports, the claims were known as the "Alabama claims".
The geologist Ferdinand Vandeveer Hayden (1829-1887) was head of the U.S. Geological and Geographical Survey of the Territories from 1867 to 1879.
Beginning in 1846, annual reports were submitted to Congress by the Smithsonian Institution. Originally limited to the business of the Board of Regents, they developed into a series of reports on research and lectures in different branches of knowledge. They were published as goverment documents and distributed to learned societies.