698 EXPEEIMENT STATION RECORD. 



In the Nashville meeting more than ever before was emphasized the im- 

 provement of rural conditions. Rural school work was extensively discussed 

 by experts from several States, farm demonstration workers and the country 

 church had a place on the pi-ogram, and invitations were sent out to a thousand 

 farmers and six hundre<l country ministers. 



Round-table conferences were held during the two days preceding the regular 

 conference, at which the subjects considered were rural school improvement, 

 sanitation, rural high schools, and the work of the corn, tomato, and poultry 

 clubs. 



An afternoon conference was devoted to agriculture and agricultural educa- 

 tion. Dr. John L. Coulter discussed Farmers' Cooperation ; Bradford Knapp, 

 director of farm demonstration work of this Department, The Demonstration 

 Work and Some of its Results; and O. B. Martin, assistant in charge of demon- 

 stration club work of this Department, the Objects of the Boys' and Girls' 

 Demonstration Work. 



Among other topics discussed either at conferences or at meetings of affiliated 

 societies were The Rural School as a Center of Country Life, The Rural Life 

 Survey for Church and School, The Education of the Negro in the South, 

 Health in Country Schools, and Rural Education a National Failure. 



International Association of Poultry Instructors and Investigators. — Con- 

 siderable progress is reported in extending the scope of this organization to 

 include poultry instructors and investigators throughout the world. A pro- 

 visional international committee has been formed with representatives In 

 England, Scotland, Ireland, Australia, Tasmania, South Africa, India, Ger- 

 many, Holland, Belgium, Denmark, Norway, and Italy. The representatives 

 of the United States are J. E. Rice of Cornell University, L. J. Cole of the 

 University of Wisconsin, and Dr. Raymond Pearl of the Maine Station, and 

 those of Canada, W. R. Graham of Ontario Agricultui*al College and F. C. 

 Elford formerly of MacDonald College. 



Arrangements are being made for an initial meeting of this committee in 

 London, July 18-24. Edward Brown, secretary of the National Poultry Organi- 

 zation of England, has been elected president, and Dr. Raymond Pearl, honorary 

 secretary pro tem. 



Reorganization of Agricultural Agencies in Peru.— A decree issuetl by Presi- 

 dent Leguia January 19 reorganizes the agricultural work carried on by the 

 Ministry of Public Works, and establishes a central agronomic station at Santa 

 Beatriz, near Lima. 



This station is to be under the provisional charge of the director of the 

 National Agricultural School, Senor Jorge Rorive, with 11 bureaus as follows: 

 General agriculture, which will carry on experiments dealing with the intro- 

 duction and acclimatization of plants; applied botany and vegetable physiology, 

 which will study the national flora and plant diseases, and administer the 

 seed distribution ; agricultural microbiology, serum, and vaccination, to have 

 charge of the National Institute for these purposes; agricultural physics and 

 chemistry, chiefly for analytical work ; zootechnics, to study the possibilities 

 of livestock improvement by breeding and importation, and to have charge 

 of the Zootechnic Experimental Station of Lima ; applied technology, to foster 

 industries derived from agriculture and stock raising; viticulture and enology, 

 which will include the present work under way at Lima, Moquegua, and lea ; 

 silviculture and arboriculture, which will include the work at Santa Beatriz 

 with fruit trees and floriculture; rural engineering; and agricultural propa- 

 ganda, which will administer the central station, the rice station at Lam- 

 bayeque and the rubber station at Iquitos, and will have charge of all 

 publications. 



