ApKlL 8, 1921] 



SCIENCE 



335 



THE COST OF AMERICAN PUBLICATIONS IN 

 ROUMANIA 



To THE Editor of Science: Foreseeing the 

 high soar of science in the United States and 

 desiring to be acquainted with the scientific 

 events in that country and to pursue the ac- 

 tivity of my numerous American friends and 

 acquaintances, I have been for twenty years 

 a subscriber to Science. 



In December l&st, I renewed my subscrip- 

 tion of seven dollars, which cost now in Rou- 

 manian money 595 lei instead of 35 lei in 1914. 



In the university library of Cluj, otherwise 

 well furnished, and in the libraries of the vari- 

 ous institutes, the American publications are 

 almost completely wanting; in the laborator- 

 ies and clinics of our university there is no 

 instrument or apparatus of American fabri- 

 cation. The Hungarian administration, that 

 had governed this university until 1919, had 

 not yet discovered America. 



The leaders and professors of the actual 

 Roumanian University are very desirous to 

 acquire the American books and periodicals; 

 they would like to make use of the best in- 

 struments and apparatus constructed in the 

 United States. They can not conceive that a 

 modem and progressive university, as theirs, 

 should lack the intellectual and technical co- 

 operation of the American science. 



But a microtome " Spencer " cost me 15,000 

 lei and a binocular " Spencer " 12,000 lei, to 

 which must be added the transport and insur- 

 ance expenses, eitc. 



There is no scientific institute that oould 

 afford such an expenditure, and no Rouman- 

 ian institution can make " scientific pur- 

 chases " in the United States as long as the 

 doUar is worth 90 lei. 



I I take leave to draw the attention of the 

 readers of your journal to this sad result of 

 the world's war and to ask them if there might 

 not be found any means to cure this evil, 

 which is detrimental to both our nations. 



I have great hopes that from the American 

 practical spirit and high love of science will 

 spring the best solution of this great difficulty 

 and therefore I beg the editor of Science to 



open its columns to the study of that question. 

 I am at the disposal of the readers of 

 Science who would desire any explanation 

 about our university and who would like to 

 transmit us directly their ideas or proposi- 

 tions. E. G. Racovitza, 



University professor, director of the 

 Institute of Speology 

 TJNivEBsiry of Cluj, 



EOUMANIA 

 REQUESTS FOR BIOLOGICAL PUBLICATIONS 



Professor Carl J. Cori has resumed his 

 academic relations with the German univer- 

 sity at Prague, Czecho-Slovak republic, in 

 consequence of the transfer of the Marine 

 Biological Station at Trieste, of which he was 

 formerly director, from Austrian to Italian 

 control. He desires to receive reprints and 

 other biological works, especially those pub- 

 lished since the outbreak of the war, which 

 American biologists may wish to send him, 

 at the Zoological Institute of the German uni- 

 versity at Prague. 



Charles A. Kofoid 



SCIENTIFIC BOOKS 



Eoot Development in the Grassland Forma' 

 tion, a Correlation of the Root Systems of 

 Native Vegetation and Crop Plants. By 

 John E. Weaver. Carnegie Inst. Washing- 

 ton Publ. 292. 18 X 26 cm., 151 pp., 25 pi., 

 39 text fig. Washington, 1920. 

 Students of plant physiology, ecology, agri- 

 culture and forestry, when they have taken 

 occasion to survey the general field in which 

 their own particular interests lay, must often 

 have been greatly impressed with the extreme 

 paucity of our knowledge of plant roots. 

 Plant species have been described and rede- 

 scribed, t3T)ical individuals have been photo- 

 graphed and painted, and thousands of pages 

 in our libraries are devoted to the results of 

 these descriptive studies and to their theo- 

 retical interpretation — but the far greater part 

 of our accumulated knowledge of higher 

 plants is closely confined to those portions of 

 the plants that are readily seen and may be 



