494 



SCIENCE, 



[N. S. Vol. VIII. No. 198. 



gas inside tlie bulb. A small fraction of a 

 millionth would be sufficient, and this might 

 escape detection by the pressure gauge, on 

 account of the necessary compression in the 

 gauge head causing absorption by the glass. 

 Again, etherion must always be present to 

 some extent in all ' vacuum tubes ' (as well 

 as in my own conduction bulb), on account 

 of its long continued evolution from glass, 

 and may be the medium of propagation of 

 the Rontgen rays in the vacuum glass and 



Charles F. Brush. 



Cleveland, O. 



TEE NEW YORK STATE COLLEGE OF 

 FORESTRY* 



Ever since the American Forestry Asso- 

 ciation was formed at Cincinnati, in 1882, 

 the need of providing for forestry education 

 has been a favorite topic at the meetings. 

 There were those who wished to make the 

 subject a part of the studies in the public 

 schools, and others who desired the estab- 

 lishment of special schools, either separate 

 or in connection with other educational in- 

 stitutions. 



Fortunately for our public schools and 

 over-burdened school teachers, who are 

 struggling not always quite successfully to 

 do justice to their legitimate functions, the 

 schemes of our enthusiastic forestry re- 

 formers in the first direction have not ma- 

 tured beyond the introduction of an Arbor 

 Day celebration, perhaps an occasional 

 reading or talk, quite sufBcient to call the 

 attention of the young mind to the existence 

 and significance of the subject. 



Those who had higher aims and expected 

 that the existence of technically educated 

 foresters would pave the way to the appli- 

 cation of their art contemplated, in their 

 philanthropic desires, the sacrifice of the in- 

 dividual to the cause ; for unless the stu- 

 dents issuing from such forestry schools 



* Read before the American Forestry Association at 

 Boston, August, 1898. 



had other means of subsistence, their bread, 

 if they could earn it, would hardly have 

 been buttered through their knowledge of 

 forestry. 



It may be set down as an axiom that the 

 emploj'ment of any specialist in a technical 

 art comes, as a rule, when the economic 

 conditions are ripe for such employment. 



In the United States the exploitation of 

 all resources has, as in every newly-settled 

 country, been carried on without the 

 technically educated specialist ; until 1870 

 or thereabout mining engineers were a 

 rarity, and the exploitation of the soil by 

 agriculture has only just begun to be con- 

 sidered an art ; agricultural rapine is still 

 largely the practice, just as the natural 

 resources of the forest are and will be still 

 for some time the object of the lumberman's 

 rapine. 



When does the time for a change come ? 

 When does it become necessary to employ 

 skill and art in the use of our resources ? 

 These are difiScult questions to answer. In 

 a general way, from the standpoint of the 

 individual the answer can only be one, 

 namely, ' when it pays ;' a consideration 

 of supply and market conditions determines 

 for him when his financial interests are best 

 subserved by the use of greater skill and 

 knowledge. He may not always recognize 

 the right moment, but it would be a profit 

 calculation which would have to be em- 

 ployed to persuade him of its arrival. 



From the sbmdpoint of the community, 

 the State, the financial consideration may 

 be quite secondary; the interest in the 

 preservation of certain favorable conditions 

 may justify an expenditure, a sacrifice of the 

 present for the sake of the future. 



It was the recognition that such an inter- 

 est existed which induced the State of New 

 York to take a first step with regard to her 

 forest resources thirteen years ago by ceas- 

 ing to dispose of the forest lands which the 

 State had unwillingly acquired through 



