LIBKARY 

 NEW YORK 

 BOTANICAL 



IMPERIAL DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE FOR THE WEST INDIES. oARDEts. 



A FORTNIGHTLY REVIEW 



Vol. VIIT. No isl. 



BARBADOS, APRIL 0, 1909. 



Peice Id. 



The United States Department 



of AgncUilture. 



'y PiOM the summarized accolint which \va,s 

 ,w,,j ffiven in the editorial of thu last issue, 

 ''^^ some idea will have been gained of the 

 g^ general organization and extent of the operations of 

 Q- the United States Department of Agriculture. It will 

 Q- now be interesting to consider in fuller iletail the 



special work of the Btireau of Chemistry, and the 

 Bureau of Sails. 



The Bureau of Chemistry has been busily occupied 

 recently iu investigations relating to foods, its energies 

 being largely directed to the problem of securing whole- 

 some food supplies. The lines of investigation have 

 been extremely numerous. 



An immense anionnt of work has been done in 

 organizing a .system of food inspection, and of investi- 

 gating aiid detailing meth,ods of examination inv the 

 detection of adulterated or unwholesome foods, the 

 great activity in this direction being rendered necessary 

 by the introduction cif new and far-reaching legislation 

 on the subject. 



All this has involved the examination of a v.-ist 

 number of food substances of the most varied kind, 

 resulting in information valuable not only to the 

 Bureau in question but to the world at large. 



This Bureau h;is, amongst many other lines of 

 work, investigated the effect on the human systeni of 

 various substances used as preservatives of foods. 

 iJuring the year 1907 attention in this connexion was 

 largely centred on the question of the use of sulphur 

 as a lileaching tigent in the preparation of foods, and 

 of sulphurous acid and sidphites as preservative agents. 

 With regard to sulphurous acid and sulphites, experi- 

 ments carried out on twelve young men by this Bureau, 

 show unmistakably the injurious effect of these 

 preservatives, especially in reducing the number of red 

 corpuscles in the blood. 



The Bureau of Soils is an offshoot of the Bureau 

 of Chemistry, the enormous extent and importance of 

 the work relating to soils justifying the creation of 

 a separate Bureau, which now has in hand some of the 



