THE AGRICULTURAL NEWS. 



January 9, 1908, 



unbroken activity, and that activity has spread itself 

 in every direction in which the welfare of agriculture in 

 the West Indies might be directly or indirectly affected. 



The first task was, while utilizing existing 

 Botanic Departments and their staffs, U) remould them 

 in a more agricultural form, and to institute agricul- 

 tural experiment stations where every tropical product 

 ■with any promise of value might be subjected no care- 

 ful trial cultivation. Sugar was, and is still, the 

 mainstay of a large part of the West Indies, and the 

 Commissioner accordingly devoted great attention 

 to the reorganization of the sugar-cane experiments, 

 which for many years had been carried on at Barbados 

 and Antigua. Large tyrants were made for the provis- 

 ion of adeijuate staffs and expenses, .and extensive series 

 of experiments were begun for the raising and testing 

 of seedling varieties, and for testing the effect of 

 various manures and methods of tillage upon the 

 growth and yield of the sugar-cane. A number of other 

 matters bearing upon the same subject were carefidly 

 investigated, and in recent, years the. production of 

 hybrids of known parentage, and the investigation of 

 hybridization of the susrar-cane on Mendelian lines 

 have formed part of the work of the Department. As 

 u result of ten years' work, while such valuable varie- 

 ties as B. 147, B. 208, and B. 376 have been brought 

 into prominence and thoroughly tested, some 30,000 

 new varieties of cane have been raised in Barbados 

 as seedlings, and are being tested agriculturally 

 and chemically : and there is good reason to hope 

 that some of them will prove a material advance on the 

 older varieties, not only in their yields of cane and sugar, 

 but also in other valuable properties, especially in their 

 power of resisting the various diseases that in the past 

 have caused so much loss to the industry. 



The revival of the cotton industry will be alluded 

 to later, but the large number of tropical products and 

 subjects connected with them, which have received 

 attention and investigation at the hands of the Com- 

 missioner of Agriculture and his staff, will l)e realized 

 by a perusal of the list of ' Pamphlets ' published dur- 

 ing the past ten years. These pamphlets, each of which is 

 a innlfam in parvo on the subject of which it treats, 

 amount to some fifty-four in number, and include 

 pamphlets on Sugar-cane Experiments, Treatment of 

 Insect Pests,' Plain Talk to Small Owners,' Treatment of 

 Fungoid Pests, Onion Cultivation, Ground Nuts^ 

 Diseases of the Sugar-cane, Moth Borer in Sugar-cane, 

 Manurial Experiments, Bee-keeping, Oranges, Tobacco, 

 ' Hints to Settlers in Tobago,' Lime Cultivation, Fungus 

 Diseases of Cacao, Millions and Mosquitos, 'ABC of 

 Cotton Cultivation,' and other subjects. 



Agricultural Education received attention fron» 

 the first. Grants were made for instruction in Agri- 

 cultural Science, and f)r the provision of exhibitions at 

 Harrison College, Barbados, and at the Grammar 

 School, Antigua. Courses of lectures were given t.> 

 primary school teachers in various islands, grants were 

 made to assist in providing agricultural in.^truction in 

 the [irimary schools, and Industrial Agricultural 

 schools were founded at St. Vincent, St. Lucia, and 

 Dominica, where the sons of small proprietors are 

 r)rovided free with education, board, lodging and cloth- 

 ing, and receive a three- or four-years' course of instruc- 

 tion in the theory and practice of Agriculture, adapted 

 to the needs of the overseer and small proprietor. 

 The peasant propiiL-tor and small plantation-tenant 

 shows, inaugurated by Sir Daniel Morris and regularly 

 held every year liy the Department, must also rank as 

 among his iujportatit educational efforts. 



Pu c ignizing that .-ui ethcient means of circulating 

 the inf Tmation gathered by the Department was all 

 impoit-mt, great attention was devoted to publications. 

 The first number of the llV.sf Inillan Bulletin., 

 a scientific review of the work of the Depart- 

 ment, appeared in July 1899, and has since been issued 

 at quarterly inteivals. The large reports of the Sugar- 

 cane experiments at Barbados, and the Leeward 

 Islands, as well :is the annual pamphlets which give 

 a popular summaiy iif the same work, and the annual 

 reports of the f! .tiuie and Agricultural Stations and 

 Ao-ricultural Schools of the various islands, are well 

 known. Then there is the long pamphlet series on 

 various suljjects alnady alluded to. Last and not least^ 

 there is the A(jricultt(ral JS^ews, a popular fort- 

 nightly review of the work of the Imperial Department 

 of Agriculture, which first appeared in April 1902, and 

 has enjoyed a steady and rapidly increasing circulation 

 ever since. 



The broad view that was taken by Sir Daniel 

 Morris, who received the honour of knigiithood in 

 1903, as to the scope of his uurk for ilie West Indies, 

 is nowhere more clearly shown than in his efforts to 

 improve the trade relations between the West Indies 

 and Canada, which resulted in a Conference of 

 Representatives in 190S, and the appointment by the 

 Dominion of a special Trade Commissioner. The full 

 fruit of this movement has yet to be gatherc^d. 



While Sir Daniel brought together and co-ordina- 

 ted the work of the scientifi/ officers already existing 

 in the West Indies, he also introduced and trained 

 a number of young University science graduates in the 

 Department. It is safe to say that the experience they 



