36 LETTERS ON AGRICULTURE. 



cal experimentation on the farm may be explained by the fondness of 

 Japanese students for quiet contemplation. Microscopic and artistic 

 descriptive work appeals to them more than practical field experiments. 

 This, it is said, is a deplorable feature of Japanese medical education 

 also, the young doctors mastering thoroughly the theory of medicine, 

 but rarely learning it as an art. 



This increased interest in scientific plant cultivation in Japan is 

 unmistakable, and with the introduction of compulsory school educa- 

 tion several 3 r ears ago and the formation in every district of agricul- 

 tural societies, the quick dissemination and assimilation of new facts 

 relating to the different plant industries are practically assured. Bul- 

 letins, illustrated with photographs and charts for the instruction of 

 the farmers, are being printed by the thousand, and in the middle 

 schools the sciences related to agriculture are taught much as they are 

 in America. Even in many of the primary schools, gardens of named 

 plants for the instruction of the children are to be found. These 

 changes would come slowly with any other race than one which, like 

 the Japanese, is saturated with a love for plants. The lowest-born 

 cool}* knows more about the care of a potted plant than 90 per cent of 

 the educated classes of America or Europe. The} r are a race of plant 

 artists, and care for fancy varieties of flowers as other nations do for 

 pet animals. Yet it is a surprising* fact that notwithstanding this love 

 for plant life the Japanese are not great plant breeders, and artificial 

 hybridization is a process not well understood by them. 



One of the effects of Western civilization upon the country will be 

 the gradual introduction of more meat into the daily diet of the peo- 

 ple. Already the number of butcher shops in all of the principal 

 cities is increasing, and the number of animals slaughtered is three 

 or four times what it was ten years ago. The growing taste of the 

 Japanese for foreign food is recognized as a fact by many old resident 

 Americans. Whether the Government will succeed in making stock 

 raising an important industry in the country is a debatable question. 



The tea industry has received a new stimulus through the removal 

 of the duty in our country, but the president of the largest association 

 of tea growers in Japan stated that it will not lead to any considerable 

 increase in the tea-growing area. At a recent meeting of the associa- 

 tion a resolution was passed having for its object the improvement of 

 the quality of the exported article rather than the increase of the quan- 

 tity. The exporters say that the change in the tariff has had the effect 

 of raising the price at which the Japanese producers sell to them. 



Within the last two or three years, machinery has been introduced 

 successfully into a number of tea-firing factories, and one of these fac- 

 tories where 10 men now do the work which it required 100 to do 

 before was visited. The rolling of the fresh leaf is still done by hand, 

 tiowever, although the central experiment station experts are working 



