794 EXPERIMENT STATION RECORD, 



ieitilized fresh laid eggs were more ofteu germ free than fertilized eggs, which 

 is explained by the fact that the bacteria pass into the white or yolli during 

 development and by way of the fallopian tube and cloaca during the process of 

 fertilization. When 54 per cent of the eggs, some of which were fresh and 

 others which were infected afterwards, were examined, staphylococci were 

 found in from 60 to TO per cent of the cases. Streptococci and bacilli were also 

 found, but in no instance were the organisms pathogenic. 



With reference to the spreading of disease by the egg shells coming in contact 

 with feces, blood, and other dejecta of animals, the author shows that with fowl 

 cholera and erysipelas the virus soon loses its virulency, while on the other 

 hand the paratyphoid bacillus migrates through the shell ;ind into the eng and 

 also exists on shells polluted with feces for a long time. 



RURAL ECONOMICS. 



Farm labor in California {Pacific Rural Press, 79 (1910), No. 2}. pp. J/GS. 

 .'i69). — This is an outline of a report by State Labor Commissioner J. S. Mac- 

 kenzie of an investigation, provided for by a special act of the legislature, which 

 has been in progress for more than a yeai*. 



The inquiry dealt with the number of farms employing labor, the different 

 races of laborers and the lines of agriculture in which they were engaged, the 

 wages paid by white and Japanese farmers, statistics of the Japanese popula- 

 tion as a whole, the standard of living of farm laborers, the methods of em- 

 ploying labor, the efficiency of the various races of farm laborers, the status 

 of white laborers, and the need of introducing efficient foreign farm labor to 

 meet existing conditions in California. 



The investigations covered visits to 4.102 farms, on which it was found that 

 the average duration of employment was less than two months in the year, that 

 6S.O per cent of the whites and 61.6 per cent of the Japanese were employed le.ss 

 than three mouths, and that only 16.0 per cent of the whites and 10.7 per cent of 

 the Japanese v^-ere employed permanently. The average wage paid by white 

 farmers to white help was $1.38 per day with board, and $1.80 per day without 

 board, and to the Japanese $1.49 and $1.54, respectively. Japanese farmers, 

 however, paid to Japanese laborers an average of $1.57 iier day with board and 

 $1.65 per day without board, showing that the Jai»anese were better paid by 

 their own countrymen than by the white farmer. Notwithstanding these facts, 

 the consensus of opinion in all parts of the State was that the white man of good 

 character is i)referable to any of the alien races, but that there is not a suffi- 

 cient number of white laborers to perform the farm labor of the State. To meet 

 agricultural labor conditions in California, therefore, it is the conviction of the 

 gi-owers of fruits, truck, and other ci'ops that a sufficiency of farm labor must 

 continue to be drawn from sources outside the United States. 



The establishment of laborers on the land in England, Sweden, Denmark, 

 Holland, and Belg'ium, B. Skalweit et al. (Arcli. Dent. Latidw. Rats, 3'f 

 {1910), pp. 592-616). — This is a series of addresses delivered at the thirty- 

 eighth general meeting of the Cerman Agricultural Council held at Berlin, 

 February 15-18, 1910. 



The papers deal generally with agrarian conditions in the countries men- 

 tioned, with particular reference to recent government interest in the solution 

 of the problems relating to rural depopulation and repopulation. Recent legis- 

 lation having for its object the settlement of laborers on the land through 

 government aid is reviewed, and the economic and social results of the move- 

 ment are pointed out. The general conclusion of the speakers was that the 

 most iiractical solution of the agricultural labor problem from the economic 



