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magazines of tropical agriculture in countries far apart as the 

 poles. The works now noticed by the Philippine magazine 

 quoted are one on "Cocoa" by Dr. C. J. J. \ an Hall, director of 

 the Institute for Plant Diseases and Cultures, Java, and the other 

 on "The Coconut," by -Edwin Bingham Copeland, professor of 

 plant physiology and dean of the College of Agriculture. Uni- 

 versity of the Philippines. Both are published by Macmillan & 

 Co., Ltd., St. Martin's street, London. "The two books under 

 consideration," the reviewer says, "well represent the college 

 grade of tropical agricultural science. They are exceedingly rich 

 in the application of modern science to the growing of two very 

 important tropical crops. They probably represent the highest 

 development yet attained in the agronomy of any tropical crop." 

 As the coconut appears to be the livelier subject of the two prod- 

 ucts treated in the books mentioned,* so far as Hawaiian indus- 

 tries are concerned, the following excerpt from the review of 

 Dr. Copeland's work is selected for reproduction here : 



"Doctor Copeland's book is a splendid example of scholarly 

 and scientific treatment. It is, perhaps, the best case extant in 

 a work on any single major tropical crop of the application uf 

 modern biological methods to all the details of the agronomical 

 side of the subject. An innovation in this work, of the highest 

 possible importance, consists of a thorough consideration of the 

 physiology of the coconut tree. There is no doubt that this will 

 prove an epoch-marking event for the agronomy of all crops and 

 of all countries. We would have little resj)ect for a system of 

 medicine, or confidence in its methofls, in which there was no 

 provision for thorough technical study of the physiology of the 

 human body, yet the agronomy of most tropical and many tem- 

 perate crops is exactly in this condition — the details of the life 

 operations of the plants in question, as to their foraging ability, 

 food elaboration, water requirements, transpiration habits, or- 

 ganic reaction to surrounding conditions, and sj)ecific reaction 

 to disease, being unknown. The experience of the practical 

 planter is one continuous struggle with serious problems, many 

 of which might easily be solved through fuller knowledge of llic 

 detailed physiological operations and needs of the plant he is at- 

 tenijjting to grow. It seems that if anything is to be expected 

 from real colleges of agriculture as distinguished from farm 

 sch(H;ls, and more particularly expected from colleges of agricul- 

 ture in universities, it is a thorough grounding in these basic lines 

 of work that shall enable students to approach the jiractical ])rob- 

 lems of agronomy with broad intelligence and really adccjuatc 

 equipment. 



"In this connection l)oclf)r Co])elan(i's book furnishc:; the besl 

 exanqjle of what a textbook for a college f)f tropical agriculture 

 should be. His work is. of course, not final in any respect, and 

 he clearly recognizes, as does Doctor \an Hall, that the science 

 of tro])ical agrr)nomv is an extremcK' undeveloped one. In the 



