672 SCIENCE PROGRESS 



and fully and ably discussed, and a draft of an "Act of Par- 

 liament to Secure the Food Supplies of the United Kingdom " 

 is appended. 



Does not this show up the same shortcomings in England, 

 so often emphasised in this Quarterly, namely, that scientific 

 research is undervalued, and that through the failure of the 

 Government to endow research properly the people in the mass 

 must eventually suffer ? In many cases such results may be 

 indirect and perhaps a little difficult to trace ; but in the case of 

 agriculture the results are obvious and immediate — a shortage 

 of food. The following quotation from the pamphlet shows how 

 slow the British Government is to take up any idea. The writer 

 says: "As the Board of Agriculture, although urged to do so, 

 has taken no steps to induce English farmers to sow larger areas 

 of wheat in this country during the past sowing-season there is 

 little hope that England can greatly relieve herself from the 

 pressure which will thus be brought upon her food-supplies, 

 but even yet something may be done to stave off some of the 

 effects of starvation." In another instance a deputation of women 

 applied in the early autumn to one of the Ministers for permission 

 to organise and train female labour to try to supply the shortage 

 of male labour on the farms in the following spring. But they 

 were dismissed with a smile and the assurance that the war 

 could not last till then. But the spring has come, the war still 

 rages, the Government of Austria insists with a firm hand that 

 more land shall be devoted to wheat raising, and England has 

 still done nothing. Is it not time that we should wrest some 

 sort of a blessing out of the curses of war ? It has roused 

 England to prompt action in military matters. Can we not 

 even yet look our defects squarely in the face, and in this matter, 

 at least, urge the Government to act, and not only to act, but to 

 act at once ? 



The Professors and the Organisation of Research 



The writer of this note is certainly not the only scientific 

 man in England whose doubts as to the wisdom of our present 

 methods of organising scientific research have been accentuated 

 by Sir Ronald Ross's article in Nature of January 17. The 

 distinction there made between discovery and research states 

 the problem in a new manner. We cannot organise discovery. 

 We are unable to evoke those nutations of the intellect that 



