Maech 17, 1911] 



SCIENCE 



425 



the actual increase in prices for food that 

 must be paid by our own citizens? 



On the other hand, even the crop " statis- 

 tics " of the department of agriculture show 

 that the average yield of corn per acre in the 

 entire United States was 25.6 bushels for the 

 twenty years 18Y0 to 1889, and only 24.9 

 bushels for the twenty years 1890 to 1909, an 

 average decrease of O.Y bushel; while the 

 " statistics " for wheat show 12.2 and 13.6 

 bushels as averages for the corresponding 

 periods, an increase of 1.4 bushels, with mil- 

 lions of acres of virgin wheat lands brought 

 under cultivation. As an average the " sta- 

 tistics " show an increase of 7 per cent, in 

 yield per acre for these two greatest food- 

 grain crops; while our population actually in- 

 creased 51 per cent, during the same period. 

 Curves projected from these data may not be 

 alarming to those of the present generation 

 who have not yet felt the high cost of living, 

 but they look less comfortable for our own 

 children. 



True optimism is admirable, but blind 

 optimism is dangerous. The undersigned has 

 great faith that permanent general prosperity 

 and progress will ultimately be secured for 

 the people of the United States — not that 

 kind of existence enjoyed (?) by the densely 

 populated sections of China, which requires 

 frequent readjustments, as now in progress' 

 with the certainty of a sudden reduction in 

 population numbered by the million; not a 

 condition under which men and even women 

 gather " the katamorphic products of human 



^Nanking, China, February 3, 1911. — That the 

 deaths due to famine and the pestilence following 

 in its wake will total a million before spring was 

 the estimate submitted to the relief committee 

 here to-day. Relief workers are aghast with the 

 realization of the task before them. Even were 

 they in receipt of unlimited contributions for 

 ' relief, the missionaries, doctors and other volun- 

 teer workers would be almost hopeless in the 

 face of two and one half millions of suffering 

 people in the Anhui and Kiang Su provinces. The 

 famine is an old story in China, but the most 

 experienced relief workers declared to-day that 

 the present prospect is the worst in many years. 

 — From Press Dispatch. 



food-consumption " for a year, in order to re- 

 cover and return to the soil an amount of 

 phosphorus per individual equal in value to 

 that for which we now receive at our phos- 

 phate mines only two cents from the exporter; 

 but we seek rather a higher civilization whose 

 achievement shall be based upon a knowledge 

 of the fact that to insure permanent prosper- 

 ity we must increase production and limit 

 reproduction — especially the reproduction of 

 the unfit, whose support in penal and chari- 

 table institutions already consumes about haK 

 the total revenues of the state governments. 

 Even though the high civilization of the 

 ancient Mediterranean countries "went dovro 

 into the dark ages with laughter," all must 

 recognize and admire the recent agricultural 

 developments in western European countries; 

 but shall we ignore the fact that for five million 

 dollars we are exporting annually to Europe 

 a quantity of our highest-grade phosphate 

 sufficient for the production of 1400 million 

 bushels of wheat, that would be worth at 

 least a thousand million dollars to the oncom- 

 ing generations of Americans? 



It is true that Denmark produces 40 bushels 

 of wheat per acre, compared with 14 bushels 

 in the United States, but Denmark produces 

 only 4 million bushels of wheat, and then im- 

 ports 5 million bushels of wheat, 15 million 

 bushels of corn, the same amount of barley, 

 800 million pounds of oil cake, as much mill 

 foods, and large amounts of phosphates, sav- 

 ing and using the imported fertility; and 

 paying for it all with profit by exporting hun- 

 dreds of millions of pounds of butter and 

 bacon to a country whose degree of prosperity 

 is measured by her profits from trading upon 

 the prosperity and poverty of other larger 

 countries. 



The fundamental doctrine of the United 

 States bureau of soils is indeed a pleasant one, 

 and highly important if true, but exceedingly 

 dangerous and condemnable if not true. It 

 reads as foUows, in exact quotations : 



1. " That practically all soils contain suffi- 

 cient plant food for good crop yields ; that this 

 supply will be indefinitely maintained." — 

 Bureau of Soils Bulletin (1903) 22, p. 64. 



