218 TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



call university experts to their aid in the solution of problems of admin- 

 istrative policy and public weal. Not infrequently, as in the case of 

 Harvard University and the Massachusetts State Department of Health 

 and that of New York City and New York University, the university 

 shares with the state or city the service of expert investigators in the 

 preparation of curative sera and the study of new methods of combating 

 disease. In some states the university laboratories of hygiene, bac- 

 teriology or pathology are the research laboratories of the state. The 

 problems of agriculture, of animal industry and veterinary medicine 

 are, in the states of the middle west, largely under the control of uni- 

 versity laboratories. It is not my desire to discuss in its general appli- 

 cation the question of the part of the university in social service but 

 that the mid-western state universities have solved this question in the 

 matter of animal and plant disease and in agricultural and certain 

 industrial problems is evident from the occasional references to the 

 university as " the people's organized instrument of research " or " the 

 scientific adviser of the state." This idea of social service must, and 

 already does, to some extent, include the study of diseases of man. To 

 what extent the latter shall develop in state universities depends upon 

 the liberality of the state, or, as in non-state universities, upon endow- 

 ment by individuals. This matter of endowment is the crux of the 

 research problem in its connection with the university. It is no longer 

 possible for a medical school to be supported by the fees of its students. 

 In the old days of the proprietary school, when instruction was almost 

 entirely didactic, and the only laboratory work was the dissecting 

 room, with perhaps a room for workers in inorganic chemistry and the 

 simple procedures of so-called medical chemistry, fees sufficed and the 

 faculty could pocket a good dividend. The increased cost of laboratory 

 instruction in its many phases, the increase of equipment, of assistants 

 and attendants, have made this impossible and have forced the medical 

 schools to the shelter of universities which have resources sufficient to 

 support medicine. But even with this aid, few schools have sufficient 

 funds to satisfy the demands of adequate instruction and leave a balance 

 for investigation. The result has been that universities seek special 

 endowment for specific lines of investigation and it is unquestionably 

 along such special lines that an increase in the facilities for research is 

 to be expected. 



A consideration of the special departments of research now exist- 

 ing, of the factors determining their establishment, and of the influence 

 such departments have exerted may be worth while. It has been said 

 by some authority on university affairs, that "the best way to get en- 

 dowment is to deserve it"; and this is the principle which actuates a 

 not inconsiderable body of men scattered over this country who by 

 their efforts are attempting to bring forcibly before the public and 



