118 AGRICULTURAL REPORT. canto. 
in order to ascertain the laws which regulate these phenomena. All the 
diseases of plants known under the generic name of fungi, which occasion 
to agriculture an annual loss of millions of dollars, could also be sub- 
mitted to experimental researches to discover the origin of these patho- 
logical affections, and the means of destroying them and preventing 
their return. This capital question in agriculture sufiices in itself to 
show the immense utility of such an experimental field, the cost of 
which would be doubly returned in increased production. 
in this way the United States could enter, on a grand scale, upon the 
path inaugurated in 1822 by the celebrated Horticultural Society of 
Chiswick, in England. Notwithstanding that its researches were lim- 
ited to the application of meteorological observations to agriculture, 
aud at a time when this science was making its first appearance, many 
advantages have been drawn from its conclusions. Again, some years 
ago, Napoleon IIl, in the interest of agriculture, established, under the 
direction of George Ville, a field for chemical experiments applied to 
agriculture, with a chair of the same in the Jardin des Plantes in Paris. 
4, lt is the duty of the Government to perfect agriculture by all pos- 
sible means, and, first of all, by creating a body of State meteorologists. 
We have at present State geologists, whose studies are of great import- 
ance in public works outside of science. We have, also, State entomol- 
ogists, whose studies upon insects which injure agriculture embrace 
only their determimination and habits; beyond this knowledge the ento- 
mologist does net advance in regard to the cause of the evil, nor can he 
.furnish to the agriculturist the meansof remedying it. Why? Because 
the attack of the injurious insects upon agricultural productions is 
caused by some atmospheric or terrestrial perturbation which produces 
the disease of the plant. The fungoid growth, for example, is the result 
only of diseased plants, and not the primary cause of their ill-health, 
which lies entireiy in the atmosphere or in the earth. Itis the same 
with animals and men, where, except in the case of fracture, all diseases 
originate in a want of physical or moral harmony between the organ- 
ism and the surrounding medium. For that reason the State meteor- 
ologist, who discovers the real cause of the disease, or the diagnosis, ~ 
should precede the State entomologist, who furnishes only the classifica- 
tion and habits of insects, in order to be extinguished by some physical 
or chemical process. 
The duty of the State meteorologist would be to collect and control 
all the observations appertaining to his own State in the following man- 
ner: To form catalogues of storms, fioods, droughts, frosts, and - 
earthquakes, from the first settlement of the State until the present 
time, in order to determine. the recurrences, and to prevent possible 
injury to crops; to proceed in the same manner with the extreme 
annotations of barometric pressure, force and direction of the wind, 
temperature, moisture, great falls of rain and snow, and in a general 
way all the natural phenomena; to establish the special laws regulating 
the climatic conditions of each State, so as to be able to determine the 
general law of the whole climate of the United States; and, after a 
careful discussion of these observations, to apply them to vegetable 
growth, and to furnish to farmers only such results as would be useful 
to them. An annual report should be published for the benefit of agri- 
culturists and scientists. All these labors of State meteorologists would 
have not only a wide application to agriculture, but, in addition, would 
serve the Government under diverse circumstances, and in the various 
enterprises of public works in which an exact knowledge of climate is 
of the highest importance. | 
