September 30, 1909] 



NA TURE 



4it 



the units to which they are applied, but do, however, 

 reflect the want of uniformity in the limitation of these 

 units. The non-systeniatist wlio has to apply systematic 

 results appreciates that, as tcnowledge now stands, this 

 is unavoidable, and makes allowance for the state of 

 affairs. But applied workers complain that, in addition 

 to this, descriptive writers show a tendency to care more 

 for names than for the forms they connote, and wantonly 

 alter the designations of familiar forms. The complaint 

 is just, yet the action is not wanton. The tendency in 

 its present form is of recent origin, and, paradoxical as 

 the statement may seem, is the outcome of a wish for 

 uniformity and stability in nomenclature. Of these two 

 qualities the latter is of more importance in applied work, 

 and therefore the more essential. Unfortunately the 

 systematist has given a preponderating attention to the 

 former, and, in his effort to attain a somewhat purpose- 

 less consistency, has allowed his science to wait upon the 

 arts of bibliography. He has placed his neck under a 

 galling and fantastic yoke, for nomenclature, though a 

 good and faithful servant, is an e.xacting and singularly 

 inept master. 



To err is human, and the standard of diagnostic work, 

 high as it is, falls short of the standard which the 

 systematic worker desires to attain. It is this fact that 

 explains the remarkable openness of mind, and the great 

 readiness to accept correction, to which systematic study 

 conduces. To this also is attributable the singular freedom 

 of systematic research from the practice of making capital 

 of the fancied shortcomings of fellow-workers. Exhibitions 

 of this commercial spirit are not altogether unknown, and 

 in one narrow field, where systematic results are practically 

 applied, they are sufficiently common to appear charac- 

 teristic. But they are contrary to the traditional spirit of 

 systematic study, which is uncongenial to the arts of 

 reclame. 



The subject is by no means exhausted. Time, however, 

 forbids more ; but the purpose of this sketch will have 

 been fulfilled if it has helped those whose work lies else- 

 where to appreciate more clearly what systematic study 

 tries to accomplish, and to realise the place it fills in the 

 household of our common mistress, the Scieitlia amabilis. 



SUB-SECTION OF K. 



AGRICtJLTURE. 



Opening .-Address by M.ijor P. G. Cr.mgii;, C.B., F.S.S., 

 Chair.man of the Sub-section. 



The occupant of this chair, in the great annual conven- 

 tion of the promoters and appliers of science, cannot fail 

 at the outset of a new session to put on record his emphatic 

 endorsement of the claim, so strongly and so reasonably 

 pressed by his distinguished predecessor at Dublin, that 

 distinctively agricultural problems, instead of being re- 

 garded as a subsidiary sub-section of any single division 

 of the Association, should be accorded the full dignity and 

 convenience of a " Section." Specialised research is to- 

 day one of the governing features of scientific inquiry. 

 It is but fitting, therefore, that those who are trying to 

 equip the agriculturist with all the knowledge which recent 

 speculation and experiment have to offer for the fuller 

 and more economic development of the soil should at least 

 be allotted equal space and sectional rank with the 

 engineer, whose problems are discussed in Section G, or 

 with the schoolmaster, whose educational methods are 

 debated in Section L. 



If there were any country in the world where an apology 

 could legitimately be offered for relegating agricultural 

 science to a secondary position, it is certainly not that in 

 which we meet to-day. In this wide Dominion of Canada, 

 in this progressive province of Manitoba, in this great city 

 of Winnipeg, where the agricultural industry must 

 dominate the interests of the people, hardly any subject 

 in the whole range of study can claim a more paramount 

 degree of attention than the utilisation of the land for the 

 use of man. 



This is by no means a matter which can be disposed 

 of as an occasional side-issue in the deliberations of any 

 single Section. If we agriculturists have been tardy in 

 coming to be taught by the men of science, we are in 

 earnest now in the application for instruction that we 

 NO. 2083, VOL. 81] 



make. Neither is it to any one science we appeal. Even, 

 the stern mathematician or physicist of Section A can 

 teach us something, arithmetical and meteorological, for 

 the right conduct of our business and the wiser forecasting, 

 of our plans. The chemists of Section B have, in an 

 infinite variety of tasks, to come to the aid of the farmer, 

 and they have doubtless much to tell of the magic they 

 can promise in the direction of fertilising methods. 

 Section C must be raided for the experts who know the 

 contents of the soil itself and its capacities. Section D 

 may have much to pass on to us concerning the live stock 

 and the insect enemies of our farms. Section E may 

 enlighten us on the world-wide distribution of crops and 

 the new regions awaiting the skill of the husbandman. 

 To Section F we look for warnings as to the economic 

 conditions and barriers which — as we are apt to forget — 

 hedge round our industry, and for the statistics which 

 must govern the varying direction which we give to our 

 enterprise from time to time. The mechanical operations 

 of our calling suggest to us the practical assistance which 

 Section G can surely offer. Nor does even .Section H lie 

 wholly remote from the inquiries we may need to mak^ 

 as to the resources of the globe and the wants of diverse 

 communities. The physiology of Section I opens regions 

 of research quite germane to many of our daily studies. 

 Under Section K, as an overlord, we rest to-day assured 

 that if every botanist is not a farmer, every farmer must 

 in a sense be a practical botanist, for ever face to face 

 with the plant and its environment. Perhaps also, in 

 common with all the rest of the world, we may have 

 something to our advantage to hear from the pedagogues 

 of Section L, who may advise our scientific counsellors 

 as to the best form in which even the practical farmer may 

 be taught. 



Addressing ourselves, however, to the immediate task 

 in the sub-section allotted to us, I suggest to you to-day 

 that, having regard to the place where we meet, I may, 

 as a proper prelude to your debates, invite you to con- 

 sider, even if only in the broadest way, what are the 

 leading factors that govern the fluctuations of this our 

 industry of agriculture all the world over, and in new 

 countries in particular. The first factor of all is un- 

 doubtedly population — its growth, its rapidly varying local 

 distribution, and its changing and diversified needs. It is 

 for man that crops are raised, whether these crops are 

 to furnish food for direct consumption or for the susten- 

 ance of live stock, or whether they furnish us with our 

 clothing, like the wool and the cotton of other lands, or 

 with the materials for shelter, as the great timber crops 

 which your vast forests here may bear. When we know 

 what is the demand at any given place and time, we 

 shall be prepared to give a more exact examination to 

 the means of turning out the effective supply at the right 

 moment and in the right place, be it of wheat, of meat, 

 of fruit, of wool, of flax, of cotlon, or of timber. 



Sir Horace Plunkett told us last summer that he hoped 

 to find in an Agricultural Section " some humanised sup- 

 plement to the separated milk of statistics." Perhaps he 

 unconsciously reflected in that remark the suspicion that 

 in earlier days the agricultural debates, which, for want of 

 a better place, took place in the Economics and Statistics 

 .Section, unduly paraded the bare figures of the position. 

 But I myself confess that, however mortals may shrink 

 from the rigid arbitrament of arithmetic, neither the teach- 

 ing of the man of science nor the rhetorical advice of the 

 philosopher will lead the agricultural student of the future, 

 even if he have the luxury of a complete Section of his 

 own, to any fertile result, unless he begins by a clear 

 diagnosis of the facts as they stand, on the one hand as 

 regards population, on the other as regards production. 

 We shall by no means waste time if we try to investigate, 

 with some approach to exactness, what are the areas still 

 available for extended cultivation, and who and where are 

 the consumers of our products, and what are their present 

 and future demands. 



Obviously, however, in the limits of an Address like this 

 it is impracticable to make, in any detail, a world survev 

 such as this implies, and it is only the most patent of 

 the changes in the world's populations and their agri- 

 cultural demands which I can put before you. There was 

 a time when the human family lived in self-contained 



