508 EXPERIMENT STATION RECORD, 



;uid suction, as well as with electricity for light and power ; and there 

 are openings for connecting telephones and call bells. The supply 

 pijDes are carried just below the ceiling so that they in no way inter- 

 fere with office equipment and lead to pipe shafts provided with 

 doors so that the risers are easily accessible. A power house has been 

 erected in the court from which heat is supplied, and where all pumps 

 and machinery for maintaining the service are located. The building 

 is heated by indirect radiation, and a system of room ventilation and 

 of fines for fume chambers is provided throughont. 



The new building accommodates only a part of the Department's 

 force, so rapid has been the growth, even in the few years since the 

 Iniilding was begun. In the east wing are located the Library, which 

 occupies most of the basement floor, the Bureaus of Animal Industry 

 and of Soils, and the Office of Experiment Stations. The latter has 

 desirable quarters on the second floor, with two rooms in the base- 

 ment for the respiration calorimeter. The space provided allows the 

 bringing together of the various lines of work in charge of the Office, 

 Avhich in the past have been widely scattered. 



The west wing is occupied by the Bureau of Plant Industry. The 

 old main building and the building occupied by the Bureaus of Ento- 

 mology^ and Biological Survey will be retained for the present. 

 " Several structures in close proximity to the new building have been 

 or will be removed, in accordance with the provisions of the original 

 plan and appropriation for the building work. In carrying out this 

 plan new quarters for shops, stables, and storage are being erected 

 on the north side of the Department grounds, for which purpose a 

 special sum was appropriated by Congress at its last session." 



Xot the least advantage of the new building will be the opportunity 

 to bring the forces together Avhich have steadily become more widely 

 separated. This separation has greatly increased the difficulties of 

 administration, and the necessity of adapting the small rooms of 

 dwelling houses and flats to laboratory purposes has placed the work 

 at a constant disadvantage. 



In its completed form the new building will compare favorably in 

 its architectural features (see E. S. R., 15, p. 947) with any that has 

 been built for other branches of Government work and is well adapted 

 to the purposes for which it was designed. It is such a building as 

 Avill worthily typify the national importance of agriculture in this 

 count rv. 



