604 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XLVII. No. 1225 



others who are not scientists. Many an agri- 

 cultural bulletin is not read or is thrown 

 away by farmers because it is too technical or 

 because what they wish to know is buried in 

 hundreds of pages of detail too technical for 

 their understanding. Possibly an expert ad- 

 vertising writer could condense the labels 

 written by experts down to essentials and re- 

 write them in language understood by the 

 average farmer. Such labels consequently 

 could not give the name and address of the 

 owner, price, or other local details, but each 

 label should be an adequate article on the 

 subject, including references to both the best 

 literature and to that which is most available, 

 such as experiment station reports. It should 

 contain nothing that could be replaced by a 

 more important statement. Possibly the labels 

 would cover an 8 X 12 inch card. They wotdd 

 tell, for instance, which breed of cow was 

 good for milk, which for beef, what to feed, 

 when to water, the general values and all such 

 useful information. They would help the city 

 dweller to cooperate with the farmer, and also 

 in connection with buying, storing, drying, or 

 otherwise preserving food. They might as- 

 sist mechanics to know better how to invent 

 and to make farm machinery. 



These labels could be printed by national 

 or provincial governments and distributed to 

 each fair management so that each exhibit 

 might teach to the farmers and other citizens 

 who need the knowledge the essentials of in- 

 creasing and improving the country's food 

 supply. 



The labels may be bound into a book, or 

 rather the same type may be used to print off 

 a guide-book or elementary agricultural en- 

 cyclopedia, thus killing two birds with one 

 stone, as has been done in the case of the im- 

 perfect and incomplete preliminary edition of 

 the Handbook of the Rocky Mountains Park 

 Museum, where one type setting supplied a 

 handbook and labels for 18 museums, a zoo, 

 a paddock and other uses. The same labels 

 may also be illustrated with lantern slides or 

 moving pictures and thus serve as lecture 

 notes which may be arranged in any desired 

 order. If a local fair wishes to add advertise- 



ments or labels of unusual local products not 

 common to all fairs, such as peanuts or sweet 

 potatoes, these labels may be prepared and 

 printed locally for binding in at the back. In 

 case the local authorities wish such advertise- 

 ments or labels to local products added in the 

 body of the book, then the originating or cen- 

 tral office may supply electros or matrix of the 

 standard label matter. 



This plan would give far more accurate 

 labels and handbooks than if each fair had its 

 relatively unexpert men compose the matter. 

 It would also save the useless expense of each 

 fair composing its own labels and setting its 

 own type. 



Harlan I. Smith 



Geological Survey, 

 Ottawa, Canaba 



SCIENTIFIC EVENTS 



THE COORDINATION OF SCIENTIFIC PUBLICA- 

 TION! 



The coordination of scientific publication 

 formed the subject of a recent conferen-ce ar- 

 ranged by the Faraday Society under the chair- 

 manship of Sir Eobert Hadfield, when a num- 

 ber of interesting problems bearing on the de- 

 sirability of a fuller cooperation amongst our 

 scientific and technical societies were dis- 

 cussed. Both in the reading and publication of 

 papers there is, at present, a considerable 

 amount of overlapping and lack of coordina- 

 tion, with the result that much valuable work 

 is either lost or overlooked owing to communi- 

 cations being made to societies which are not 

 especially associated with the subject-matter 

 of the investigations concerned, and much 

 benefit would undoubtedly result from a fed- 

 eration of interests in this respect. Whilst 

 there is a general consensus of opinion that it 

 is essential to maintain the individuality of 

 each society in regard to the reading and pub- 

 lication of papers, and that any attempt to 

 pool communications for later distribution by 

 a central organization is undesirable, much ef- 

 fective cooperation could be secured between 

 kindred societies by the arrangement of joint 

 meetings and conferences with the object of 



1 From Nature. 



