INTRODUCTION 



The newness of iinich tlml scmmus to us to li.-ive .-ilways 

 been comes at times as a surprise, and sets our miiuis 

 to work in an effort to realize the euviroument of our 

 immediate forebears at n time wIumi idens now jiccepted 

 as fundamental axioms were IIk^ i^lnd ti(lin,L!:s of a uow 

 c^os]>el of kuowledii^e and truth. Only sixiy yenrs i\ii;o, 

 a little band of friends, born in America and trained in 

 good part in the universities of Germany, was laying 

 here in the new world iho foundations of <he great 

 work in agricultural scieuc(^ which is being carri<Hl on 

 today by men born in America and well traiued in 

 American universities. Workers, their methods and 

 their aims make np the early history of every branch 

 of human endeavor. The way in which they opened np 

 the lield interests the workers of today. These early 

 enthusiasts looked into the future confident that their 

 work was good and that it ought to be done; they 

 believed that without chemistry it never could be done ; 

 they sought so to raise the standards and improve the 

 methods of chemists that a chemically demonstrated 

 fact should stand unassailable. They had studied 

 under pupils of the men who saw chemistry evolve 

 from alchemy. Some of them lived to follow with 

 admiration the brilliant achievements of such men as 

 Gibbs, van 't HofT and Arrhenius, which are today 

 estal)lisliing the fundamental principles of biochem- 

 istry on which agricultural practice rests. 



From the portrait of a painter looks out the keen 

 eye of the artist. As one gazes into it all the imper- 



