THE' PROGRESS OF SCIENCE. 



479 



Rochester, Minn., who was unanim- 

 ously elected. Dr. Mayo is one of the 

 leading American surgeons and has the 

 distinction of having declined all calls 

 to large cities and institutions, pre- 

 ferring to remain in the small town 

 where St. Mary's Hospital, of which 

 he is one of the surgeons, was built for 

 his father by the Franciscan sisters. 



THE DEPARTMENT OF 

 AGRICULTURE. 

 It is much to be regretted that there 

 has been room for criticism of certain 

 officers in the Department of Agricul- 

 ture. It is also unfortunate that the 

 work of the department may be in- 

 jured by the lack of perspective and 

 search for sensationalism with which 

 the matter has been treated by the daily 

 press. So far as is known only one 

 officer of the department, and he not a 

 scientific man, has been guilty of acts 

 that warranted dismissal, but which 

 scarcely justify prosecution in the 

 courts. Two other officers of the de- 

 partment — scientific men of standing — 

 have been charged with having connec- 

 tion with commercial concerns while 

 retaining their positions under the gov- 

 ernment, but in both cases the connec- 

 tion was terminated some time ago. 

 Whether the relation of these officers 

 with the government was used to for- 

 ward these business enterprises has not 

 yet been made clear. In one case a 

 patent for a discovery was taken out, 

 and the patent given freely to the 

 people of the United States. A com- 

 pany was, however, organized to supply 

 the product. So far as the public 

 knows, the man of science who made 

 the discovery may have acted in an 

 honorable manner. He might have re- 

 signed his position, taken out patents ' 

 and become a millionaire. On the 

 contrary, he gave his patent to the 

 people, and may have taken part in 

 the organization of the company for 

 the public benefit. It appears that at [ 

 one time he considered resigning from 

 the government service and entering the '< 



service of the company, which he cer- 

 tainly had a right to do, but that when 

 he decided to remain in the Depart- 

 ment of Agriculture, he gave up his 

 connection with the company. Infor- 

 mation has not been made public suffi- 

 cient for any one to form a judgment 

 as to the conduct of the two men of 

 science referred to. It may have been 

 entirely creditable to them, or it may 

 indicate lack of a nice sense of honor. 

 An instructor in one of our leading 

 universities made a discovery in the 

 course of a scientific investigation, 

 which he patented and sold for several 

 hundred thousand dollars to a corpora- 

 tion. So far from objecting to this 

 arrangement the trustees gave the sci- 

 entific man in question leave of ab- 

 sence in order that he might arrange 

 for the sale of his patent in Germany, 

 and shortly afterwards promoted him 

 to a full professorship. If such an 

 instance were now made public in a 

 government department, it would prob- 

 ably be distorted and criticized on all 

 sides, but both the scientific man and 

 the university acted correctly. It is 

 somewhat dangerous for the man of 

 science to keep his eyes on the patent 

 office or to meddle with commercial un- 

 dertakings, for he may thus be dis- 

 tracted from more important work, but 

 it is still more dangerous to subject 

 the scientific man to orders and dis- 

 cipline from an official superior. 



For example, a newspaper as re- 

 spectable as the N. Y. Evening Post 

 seems to regard it as a scandal that a 

 scientific man received payment for an 

 article contributed to a magazine. It 

 would be entirely disastrous to the sci- 

 entific work done under the govern- 

 ment if it were ruled that scientific 

 men could publish only in the govern- 

 ment reports. The only reason why 

 these positions are attractive to men 

 of ability is that they have adequate 

 material for scientific work, and that, 

 in addition to the utilitarian work that 

 they do for the government, they are 

 able to contribute to the advancement 



