My dear Brother,—To-day I enter upon my duties. I see no particular difficulty. There is no need of being a mere office drudge. All the work can be done without any one’s breaking down. The Coast Survey is a large operation, and the charge of the office here can be made an agreeable duty. The responsibility will be considerable. But all details can be thrown upon subordinates. The fact is, the work in the world has got to be done. But it can be done by proper distribution and arrangement in an easy, quiet manner. This will be my study in my new duties.
We shall have a great session of Congress the coming winter. The whole subject of our communications with the Pacific will be discussed, railroad and ship canal across the Isthmus,—railroad through our own border. I have no doubt Congress will direct the necessary explorations and surveys to determine the practicability of the various schemes.
I am now boarding at a private house. But in a few days I shall occupy rooms, and take my meals at one of the public houses. This is the favorite mode with gentlemen that can afford it. A good parlor with sleeping-room adjoining, in a good situation, will cost me twenty-five dollars per month, the rooms being furnished, and provided with fuel, light, and attendance. And board simply, at the best public houses, will cost about twenty dollars more. This mode of living is free and easy. You go into retiracy when you choose, and can again at any moment mingle with the crowd.
I am becoming acquainted with our Maine and Massachusetts congressmen. Duncan, of Haverhill, I find quite an agreeable gentleman. Hamlin, one of the Maine senators, seems to be quite a clever fellow. Maine, however, has a mediocre representation in both branches. I was present last evening at a reception at the White House. The President looks hardy, and as though he would survive the attacks that are being made upon him. His nonchalance is by many mistaken for vacuity. The old man has an iron will and most inflexible resolution, and I assure my Democratic friends, who say that he is in the keeping of others, that before his four years are through they will be convinced of it. Take my opinion for what it is worth, brother Oliver.
The Democrats, as regards General Taylor, are pursuing the very course to reëlect him. What did the Whigs gain by representing General Jackson to be in leading-strings? Can’t we learn from our enemies?
The Coast Survey Office was indeed “a large operation.” All the maps, charts, computations, drawings, printing, engravings, instrument-making, and business administration of the survey were done here under the management and supervision of the assistant in charge. The force immediately under him comprised from sixty to seventy persons, including several army officers. The office occupied a large brick block of houses on New Jersey Avenue, corner of B Street, the house at the northeast end being the residence of the professor. The Coast Survey now occupies the other end of the same square.
The first step taken by the new chief was to organize the force into separate bureaus, each under a responsible head, and performing a particular branch of the work. This had not yet been done, although the difficulty, or impossibility, of the head of the office personally directing and supervising so many employees singly, and the details of such multifarious and complicated work, was daily becoming more evident, and doubtless was the prime cause of Captain Humphreys’s breakdown.
“On entering on my duties,” he remarks in his first report, “I saw at once that my only hope of filling the situation, with satisfaction to the survey and to myself, was in at once applying my exertions to enlarging and adapting the organization of the office to the increasing wants of the survey. The office work would necessarily increase for two or three years without any increase of field work. But it was manifest that the field work of the survey itself must increase, and thus involve a still greater increase of office work.”
Accordingly he established the Departments of Engraving, Drawing, Computing, Publication and Distribution of Maps, Archives and Library, and Correspondence. To these were soon added Electro-plating, Printing, and Instrument-making. The best-fitted men were selected from the force, or new assistants were employed and put in charge of the departments. The arrears of work were rapidly brought up; the geographical data were collected and indexed; the registry of land work was improved; volumes of observations were bound; and the register, two years behind, was brought up to date. In his first report, the new assistant in charge announced that the Drawing Department would be up to the wants of the survey in one year, and made many useful recommendations for the improvement of the service.
Professor Bache warmly acknowledged the efficiency of his young assistant in his reports. December 5, 1851, he declares:—