Mat 12, 1916] 



SCIENCE 



665 



elaim for our bureau in this connection is 

 that we sometimes recognize the obvious. 



Those of us who have been responsible 

 for the work of securing the needed appro- 

 priations are at times likely to have our 

 judgment warped by what we think are 

 the exigencies of the case. A member of a 

 scientific bureau was once so concerned for 

 the success of his bureau that he even 

 recommended its transfer to another de- 

 partment so as to get under the wing of a 

 more generous appropriation committee. 

 The logic of the situation does not always 

 appeal to us, and we are willing for the 

 moment to sell our birthright for a larger 

 appropriation. The obvious fact in this 

 matter of the interrelations of the scientific 

 bureaus of the government is that if the 

 bureau chiefs do not always exhibit an ap- 

 preciation of the proprieties in scientific 

 investigation nor seem to possess much 

 idea of perspective in the alignment of 

 boundaries, can even the most experienced 

 legislators be expected to make the best dis- 

 tribution of scientific work? 



The possession by any bureau of even a 

 skeleton organization of eiScient specialists 

 in a certain field would seem to be the 

 practically unanswerable argument for en- 

 trusting to that bureau any new and en- 

 larged work in that field whenever Congress 

 deems larger appropriations advisable. 

 That is the type of practical logic that is 

 recognized in private business, for under 

 public regulation of natural monopoly the 

 public-utility company that first enters the 

 local field is recognized and even protected 

 by the public-service commission, as long as 

 the service rendered is at all adequate. In 

 the business world the day of preferment of 

 special applicants in the granting of munic- 

 ipal franchises has passed, and in our gov- 

 ernment business there is no better reason 

 for granting special privileges to over- 

 zealous bureau chiefs. I sometimes think 



that the bureau chief comes nearer being 

 safe and sane in his public acts and utter- 

 ances in the intervals between sessions of 

 Congress. 



In this informal comparison of the actual 

 and the ideal in the administration of the 

 scientific bureaus of the government, I have 

 had ever in mind the existence of a real 

 basis for optimism in the splendid record of 

 the Coast and Geodetic Survey and the 

 Geological Survey in absolutely coordi- 

 nating their endeavors in the public service. 

 And I desire simply to add that this prac- 

 tical cooperation has been so easily accom- 

 plished that it is only as we review these 

 several decades of joint work tod estimate 

 the value of the reciprocal services ren- 

 dered that we realize how ideal have been 

 the relations between the two Surveys. 



George Otis Smith 

 U. iS. Geological Survey 



ABSTRACTS OF ADDRESSES AT THE 



CENTENNIAL EXERCISES OF THE 



U. S. COAST AND GEODETIC 



SURVEY 



APRIL 5, 1916 



The Bureau of Fisheries and Its Belation to the 

 United States Coast and Geodetic Survey: Dr. 

 Hugh M. Smith. 



Long before the Coast and Geodetic Survey and 

 the Bureau of Fisheries were adopted by the same 

 mother department and thus became sisters; in 

 fact as early as 1873, when the former had al- 

 ready attained a robust maturity and the latter 

 was still in swaddling clothes, there began close 

 cooperative relations. These have continued up 

 to the present time and have increased in inti- 

 macy and value in more recent years since the two 

 establishments became members of the same ofS- 

 eial family. It is only fair to acknowledge that at 

 first the cooperation was very one-sided, consisting 

 largely of the bestowal by the Coast and Geodetic 

 Survey of substantial favors in return for profuse 

 thanks. From 1880, when the Bureau of Fisher- 

 ies began to acquire vessels of its own, that serv- 

 ice began to repay, in part at least, some of its 

 obligations, and ultimately it contributed substan- 

 tially to the published records of the Survey. The 

 former has always depended on the latter for its 



