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        334
 January 25 1877

Professor S.F. Baird
 Representative of Smithsonian Institution and Commissioner of Food Fishes
  Sir:
     In answer to yours of 23d inst. stating that unless you can obtain credit from the railroad companies for the cost of transportation or make some other arrangement for the same it will be impossible for you to remove by March 1, 1877 the larger portions of the collection now remaining at the Government Building I beg to say that immediately upon receipt of your letter of 19th inst asking that "whatever arrangement may be made for the sale of the Building the period of delivery be placed not earlier than the first of March , or later, if possible" I telegraphed the bidder to state the latest date at which he would be willing to accept the building on the bid put in by him and received a reply placing the date at March 1, 1877. This date being in consonance with your expressed wishes I formally accepted the bid and notified the bidder that the Building  would be turned