196 Missouri Agricultural Report. 



that he sees, not only in this country but in foreign countries, is 

 less and less satisfied with what he is doing with his soils; and I 

 find that the demand for the soil survey is growing so fast that 

 the Bureau of Soils, with all its resources, is unable to keep up 

 with the work. The Bureau of Soils has surveyed about 400 

 areas, aggregating about 180,000 square miles; that is larger than 

 Great Britain and Ireland (120,000 square miles), larger than 

 the Empire of Japan, nearly as large as France or Germany. The 

 map here (showing map) shows you the distribution of the work 

 and shows another very interesting thing which, as it stands, 

 seems a very embarrassing thing to me : That the amount of work 

 we have done is still but a small proportion to the amount that 

 will have to be done to make a soil survey of the United States. 

 If Congress, in its wisdom, continues the survey until it covers 

 the United States, and we should decide to complete that por- 

 tion of the country east of the 100th meridian on a scale of one 

 inch to the mile, and this portion of the country (pointing to the 

 map) on a scale of six inches to the mile, then we have finished 

 about 13 per cent of the area east of the 100th meridian that will 

 have a detailed soil survey. However, while it seems to us who are 

 responsible for the work, that we have done great things in covering 

 so large an area, while we will this year, if the appropriations by 

 Congress permit, cover 40,000 square miles — an area larger than 

 England, on a scale of one inch to the mile, and 100,000 square 

 miles of reconnaissance work in the Great Plains region, there 

 are none of the foreign governments that have undertaken what 

 seems to them so stupendous a work as to make a soil survey 

 of their own territory — a work that this country is doing in a 

 quiet way, and has in the short time that the work has been carried 

 on, surveyed areas equal to or larger than several of the European 

 countries. We compare our country in its financial standing, in its 

 bank reserves, in its foreign commerce, in its battleships, in its 

 agricultural productions, with Great Britain, or France, or Ger- 

 many; but when we come to the soil survey we find that the 

 area of the United States is not comparable with the size of Great 

 Britain or with Germany, but the whole of Europe, and what we 

 have undertaken to do is to make a soil survey not equal to one of 

 our foreign countries, but equal to all European countries com- 

 bined. Now, that leads us to think of the possibility of develop- 

 ment of this country if we shall produce upon our soils what 

 they are producing in these older settled countries of Europe. 

 The time will come, if we develop in the future as we have 



