October 3, 1913] 



SCIENCE 



481 



vided for supplying nitrogen and liberating 

 mineral plant food in rational systems of 

 farming, the relationship between the chem- 

 ical composition of the soil and crop produc- 

 tion is normally very apparent. Irrational 

 systems often give abnormal results, and their 

 correct interpretation requires that no impor- 

 tant factor of influence shall be ignored. 



It may be added that the wheat from our 

 well-treated and high-yielding plots is not of 

 poor quality, but of very high grade, and has 

 been sold to the experienced grain buyer at a 

 premium as high as 15 cents per bushel above 

 that paid for wheat from unfertilized well- 

 rotated land. 



In Illinois, as in all other states, most of the 

 soil and crop investigators are men of large 

 practical farm esperience, but we also have 

 deep respect for the science of analytical 

 chemistry, as the only means of determining 

 the total stock of plant food in the soil, and 

 for the science of biochemistry, as the chief 

 means of making plant food available. 



Chemists and agronomists must honor Jen- 

 sen for the information and method which 

 he gave to the world relating to the destruc- 

 tion of fungous diseases sometimes carried in 

 seed grain, and we honor BoUey for his val- 

 uable contributions in this field of agricultural 

 research; but we also recognize that the avoid- 

 ance of fungous diseases as one among the 

 many advantages and reasons for crop rota- 

 tion and for the proper handling of crop 

 residues is not a new idea, for it has been 

 advanced, explained and emphasized by nu- 

 merous investigators for many years. The 

 persistent efforts to belittle the importance of 

 positive soil enrichment and preservation in 

 permanent rational systems of farming, 

 whether by improvident landowners, by 

 Whitney and Cameron, of the Bureau of 

 Soils, or by Professor Bolley, are the greatest 

 curse to American agriculture and the great- 

 est danger to permanent prosperity in this 

 country. 



The fact that the earth is round became 

 generally accepted two or three centuries after 

 its discovery; and it required a full centiiry 

 for Europe to haK appreciate the great dis- 



covery by De Saussure, so well expressed in 

 the words of Liebig: 



It is not the land itself that constitutes the 

 farmer's wealth, but it is in the constituents of 

 the soil, which serve for the nutrition of plants, 

 that this wealth truly consists. 



The foundation principles for the restora- 

 tion and preservation of the fertility and pro- 

 ductive power of normal soils are simple and 

 well-established, and no state in the union can 

 afford to ignore or belittle these great funda- 

 mental truths, nor to have the minds of its 

 farmers and landowners befogged in relation 

 thereto. Cyril G. Hopkins 



University of Illinois 



SCIENTIFIC BOOKS 

 The Living Plant. By William F. Ganong. 



New York, Henry Holt and Co. 1913. 



17 X 23 cm. Pages sii + 478 ; 3 colored 



plates; 178 figures, many in text. Price, 



$3.50. 



This book aims to attract popular interest 

 and at the same time to tell the truth about 

 its subject. The work is avowedly not in- 

 tended for scientists, but " it seeks to present 

 to all who have interest to learn an accurate 

 and vivid conception of the principal things 

 in plant life" (preface). Thus the author 

 has " been at more pains to be clear than to 

 be brief," and the book " has wandered 

 through a leisurely course to a length quite 

 shockingly great" (preface). Nevertheless, 

 the depth in natural science to which the 

 reader is here carried is so great as to make 

 it probable that the book will find its greatest 

 use among those who already possess consider- 

 able knowledge of plants and their processes. 



The style of the book combines clearness 

 with personal frankness, the reader being 

 taken into the author's confidence from the 

 very first; it is a conversational style of the 

 highest type, becoming even chatty at points, 

 and generally maintaining a logical clearness 

 and definiteness that is rare in popular or even 

 elementary treatises upon such complex sub- 

 jects. The language possesses a characteris- 

 tic quaintness, almost an archaic tang at 

 some points. A few examples of quite col- 



