464                HISTORICAL SKETCH OF THE   SOCIETY.
induced by Mr. Fulton to transfer them to the society. The trunk in which they were contained, was in the possession of the latter at the time of his decease, and in July, 1816, their reception by the society was duly announced. In the following year, Mrs. Morris, of Morrisania, relict of Gouverneur Morris, presented to the society portraits of Columbus, Americus Ves-pucius, Cortez, and Magellan, copied from the originals, it is said, in the Florence Gallery. To these has been recently added a copy of an original portrait of Sebastian Cabot, for which the society is indebted to the artist, Mr. C. G. Thompson.
In 1814, Dr. Hosack succeeded the Rev. Dr. Miller as corresponding secretary, the latter having accepted a professorship in Princeton College, which he yet fills. The society thus lost one of its most active and useful members, to whose exertions it had been greatly indebted from the beginning. Dr. Hosack likewise took a lively interest in the prosperity of the society, and for several years was among its warmest friends. Ha was elected President on the resignation of De Witt Clinton, in 1820, and delivered several discourses before the institution, in which he displayed great learning and historical research.
In 1815, notice was given to the society that the Government House was to be sold, and that the corporation had appropriated the large building in the rear of the new City Hall for the use of this and other institutions. The following year the society accordingly removed to spacious rooms in that building, to which the name of the New-York Institution was then given. The Government House was taken down about the same time, and the grounds it had occupied were soon covered with the handsome block of houses now fronting the Bowling Green. This was orginally the site of Fort Amsterdam, which after the conquest was called Fort James, in compliment to the Duke of York; in the reign of William and Mary, Fort William ; and in the following reigns, Fort Anne and Fort George. In 1790, die legislature passed, an act authorizing the corporation to demolish Fort George, and to level the ground on which it was situated, a part being reserved for public purposes, and a part rested in the corporation for the erection of public buildings, or works of defence. The same act appointed commissioners for the purpose of causing " a proper house and other necessary buildings to be erected on some part of the lands for the use of the government of this state, and to be applied to the temporary use and accommodation of the President of the United States, during such times as congress shall hold their sessions in the city of New-York." Such was the origin of the Government House. Congress having removed to Philadelphia before the completion of the edifice, it was never occupied by the President, as originally intended, but was the residence of the gov-