September 3, 1920] 



SCIENCE 



219 



forestation of cut-over areas, the replacement 

 of timber cuttings by natural growth., the con- 

 trol of insect pests and fungus diseases of for- 

 est trees, beneficial modifications of lumbering 

 practise, the preservation of timber in use, the 

 utilization of by-products, and the relation of 

 forestry to rainfall, control of flood waters, 

 grazing, e1;c. 



The importance of the most penetrating 

 study upon the conservation of our remaining 

 forest resources is brought home -by the recent 

 announcement of the Forest Service that 

 " three fifths of the original timber of the 

 United States is gone and that we are using 

 timber four times as fast as we are growing 

 it." Our annual consumption of lumber alone 

 is over 300 board feet per capita, and of news- 

 print lis 33 pounds per capita. Cut and 

 burned over forest lands in the United States, 

 now waste territory, equal in area the whole 

 of the present standing forests of Denmark, 

 Germany, Holland, Belgium, France, Switzer- 

 land, Spain and Portugal. The total popula- 

 tion of these countries is about 152,200,000, 

 nearly 50 per cent, greater than the popidation 

 of the United States. 



OFFICE OF DEVELOPMENT WORK 



Commercial and industrial concerns will be 

 helped to apply new processes and discoveries 

 of chemists in the United States Department 

 of Agriculture by an Office of Development 

 Work just created by the Secretary of Agricul- 

 ture in the Bureau of Chemistry. The staff of 

 the new service will be made up of engineers 

 rather than chemists. David J. Price, chief 

 engineer in the dust-explosion investigations 

 conducted by the department, will he in charge 

 of the new work. 



Dr. Carl L. Alsberg, chief of the Bureau of 

 Chemistry, in a letter to the secretary stated 

 that such a service is urgently needed to trans- 

 late the work of the bureau into terms that 

 could be understood and applied by the 

 manufacturer and investor. Every year val- 

 uable discoveries are made concerning the 

 utilization of manufacturing waste, or a new 

 food is found, or a new dye, glue, or preserva- 

 tive. Without the service of a business office 



isuch as is now provided the value of these 

 discoveries is greatly reduced through the dis- 

 coverers's inability to present his proposition 

 in terms which the business man can under- 

 istand, and the public runs the risk of losing 

 a much-needed material. Under the new or- 

 ganization the engineers will look after the 

 product as soon as it has passed beyond an 

 experimental or laboratory stage and will pre- 

 pare estimates for the convenience of the 

 manufacturers. 



, Mr. Price and his associates will furnish 

 data upon raw-material supply, cost of pro- 

 duction, and the uses to which the product is 

 adapted — in short, they provide an unbiased 

 practical prospectus to show the public exactly 

 what may be expected from the new material 

 or process on a quantity-production scale. It 

 is believed this cooperation will develop many 

 neglected sources of public and private profit. 



SCIENTIFIC NOTES AND NEWS 



Professor George M. Stewart, director of 

 the H. K. Gushing Laboratory of Experimental 

 Medicine of Western Reserve University, had 

 conferred on him the degree of doctor of laws 

 at the recent commencement exercises of the 

 University of Edinburgh. 



The honorary fellowship of the Eoyal Col- 

 lege of Surgeons of England has been conferred 

 on Professor A. Depage, of Brussels ; M. Pierre 

 Duval, of Paris; Prof. John M. T. Finney, of 

 The Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, and 

 Dr. Charles H. Mayo, of Rochester, Minnesota. 



The University of Ottawa has conferred the 

 degree of doctor of literature on Dr. J. C. Mc- 

 Walter, high sheriff of Dublin, and president 

 of the Dublin Branch of the British Medical 

 Association. 



Baron Gerard de Geer, of Stockholm, has 

 arrived in this country to study the geological 

 chronology since the ice age in the United 

 States and Canada. He is accompanied by 

 his wife and Drs. Ernest Antevs, and Ragnar 

 Li den. 



Dr. N. L. Britton, director of the New York 

 Botanical Garden, accompanied by Mrs. Brit- 



