54 6 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



encouraged. They yield to the investigator results more solid 

 than brilliant ; they do not give quick returns of fame ; and so 

 other researches, more showy or more profitable, are in greater 

 favor. "With most men of science, unfortunately, research is a 

 matter secondary to other duties ; the professor must teach, the 

 commercial chemist must analyze ; and only the time left over, 

 the occasional leisure hour, is available for higher studies. Many 

 an able man, willing and enthusiastic, who might otherwise benefit 

 mankind by investigation, is crowded out of the field by sheer 

 necessity. He is loaded with labors which leave no time for re- 

 search, and his capacities are exhausted in mere routine. For 

 such men opportunities should not be altogether wanting. 



Sometimes the kind of work here indicated has been carried on 

 at public expense ; for example, the classical researches of Reg- 

 nault upon gases and vapors were maintained by the French Gov- 

 ernment ; but all such assistance has been sporadic, while the in- 

 vestigations needed should be continuous and systematic. In a 

 laboratory endowed, equipped, and manned for research only, a 

 rich harvest of results would be sure, far exceeding in value the 

 cost of the undertaking. No such laboratory, I believe, now exists 

 in the civilized world ; and the United States might well have the 

 glory of being the first organizer. In its Patent Office it has led 

 all other nations, and in the science which underlies invention it 

 might lead also. To the manufacturers and inventors of America 

 I offer these suggestions, in the hope that they may be speedily 

 realized. 



* 



GINSENG IN COMMERCE. 



By J. JONES BELL, M. A. 



IT is curious that, after the lapse of over a century and a half, 

 the old Canadian industry of gathering, drying, and exporting 

 ginseng should be revived. This root was one of the first articles 

 exported from Canada after the Treaty of Utrecht, and for a time 

 was considered hardly less important in commerce than fur. The 

 revival of the industry is due to the demand for ginseng among 

 Chinese, who have become a no inconsiderable element in the the 

 population of the United States, whither the most, if not all, of 

 what is now exported finds its way. 



The ginseng of commerce is the fleshy root of a perennial herb, 

 formerly called Panax quinquefolium, but now placed among the 

 dicotyledonous Araliacea?. The Chinese ginseng is probably de- 

 rived from another species of the same genus. It is a native of 

 the Middle and Northern States and Canada, but is found far 

 south on the mountains. It grows in rich soil, in shaded situa- 



