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SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXXVII. No. 958 



in regard to tlie scientifically correct prin- 

 ciples and methods of farming, and (h) to 

 stimulate him by every possible appeal to rea- 

 son, ambition and thrift to put these methods 

 into practise on his own farm. 



From this brief statement it will be appar- 

 ent that, broadly viewed, the successful pro- 

 motion of scientific farming must depend in 

 the long run on the advance made in the sci- 

 ence of agriculture. The farmer can not be 

 taught new principles and methods until these 

 have been discovered by the investigator. All 

 federal and state legislation in this country 

 looking towards the development of our agri- 

 cultural resources has included in its purview 

 these two complementary, but in practise some- 

 what conflicting needs. But there has been 

 ■comparatively little effective effort (aside from 

 the Adams Act, which has unquestionably 

 been of great aid to the cause of agricultural 

 research) sharply to distinguish between these 

 needs and to provide definitely and precisely 

 for each. Generally speaking, and with the 

 exception noted, the provisions for tax-sup- 

 ported agricultural work in the United States 

 have attempted to kill two birds with one 

 stone. The result has varied in different lo- 

 calities, but on the whole it may fairly be said 

 that the effect has usually been much more 

 marked on one of the birds than on the other. 

 Undoubtedly this country leads the world to- 

 day in the effective promotion of scientific 

 farming. This enviable position has been 

 gained through our splendidly organized sys- 

 tem of agricultural education, comprising the 

 colleges of agriculture in every state with 

 their intramural instruction, on the one hand, 

 and their extension activities, which reach an 

 astonishingly large proportion of the farming 

 population, on the other hand. Furthermore, 

 to supplement the extramural work of the col- 

 leges we have the work of the experiment sta- 

 tions and state departments of agriculture 

 and the federal department of agriculture. 

 These institutions reach the farmer in many 

 ways, but chiefly by the dissemination of use- 

 ful information in the form of bulletins, and 

 other (even more ephemeral) forms of litera- 

 ture. On the whole, it would be difficult, and 

 indeed no one has ever done so, to devise a 



better and more effective system for the pro- 

 motion of scientific farming than that which 

 we now enjoy the benefits of in this country. 



But what of the advancement of the science 

 of agriculture? There we meet a totally dif- 

 ferent condition of afl^airs. Comparisons are 

 proverbially odious, but I very much doubt if 

 many disinterested scientific men acquainted 

 with the field could be found to affirm that in 

 this particular we lead the world. Theoret- 

 ically it is a primary function of the state 

 experiment stations to conduct researches of 

 a fundamental character which shall be cal- 

 culated to discover basic natural laws. Actu- 

 ally, with a few rare and partial exceptions, 

 experiment stations do nothing of the sort. 

 On the contrary, what they do engage in is ex- 

 perimental work of a kind carefully calculated 

 to make as strong an appeal as possible on the 

 basis of its supposed " practicality " to the 

 scientifically uneducated and uncritical farm- 

 ers who make up its constituency. The ex- 

 periment station investigator in many cases 

 (though happily not in all, as I am able per- 

 sonally to affirm after five years' experience in 

 Maine) is compelled by force of circumstance 

 over which he has no control to supplicate the 

 great goddess Truth with one ear closely ap- 

 plied to the ground in order that he may catch 

 the first and faintest murmur of " what the 

 public wants." If he has the temerity to ven- 

 ture upon a piece of research for which by the 

 most extreme sophistry no evidence of im- 

 mediate practicality can be adduced, he must 

 do the work suh rosa and publish the results 

 in such place that by no possible chance can 

 the constituency ever learn of it. 



What has been said can not justly be 

 regarded as a criticism of American experi- 

 ment stations or their responsible managers. 

 It is simply a fair and candid statement of an 

 existing condition of affairs, which limits the 

 usefulness of experiment stations in certain 

 directions. The reason for the existence of 

 this condition primarily lies not in any lack 

 of high scientific ideals on the part of the 

 directorate or the workers, nor in any mis- 

 management, either intellectual or material, 

 of their institutions, hut is found in the fact 

 that they are tax-supported. The people who 



