August 12, 1904.] 



SCIENCE. 



219 



istry, entomology, vegetable physiology, to- 

 bacco, horticulture, and general affairs. The 

 results of the investigations are submitted to 

 thirty-eight experimental farms, created and 

 carried on by the provinces with the help of 

 a subsidy from the general government, and 

 theories are here subjected to the test of prac- 

 tical application before general publication. 

 Among the results already accomplished by 

 this method are improvement in the quality 

 and quantity of crops through more careful 

 selection of seeds and better understanding of 

 the varieties suited to the conditions in differ- 

 ent localities; more efficient modes of destroy- 

 ing injurious insects; ability to minimize the 

 injury from plant diseases, such as smut, mil- 

 dew, pear cluster-cups, etc. ; increased skill in 

 the application of fertilizers, and the discovery 

 of indigenous grasses suitable for meadows, 

 all meadow grasses having formerly been im- 

 ported. 



The general government aids the local treas- 

 uries to maintain six local agTicultural schools 

 for the instruction of farmers' sons in the 

 general principles of agriculture, surveying, 

 -veterinary science, and related subjects. The 

 government also carries on an experimental 

 tea farm, on which is a curing workshop ; a 

 laboratory for investigating the disease of 

 cattle and poultry; a cattle-breeding pasture 

 for improving the native breeds of cattle for 

 meat and dairy purposes,- and two horse-breed- 

 ing pastures for promoting the introduction of 

 Isetter horses. 



Efforts have been made to introduce sheep 

 -Taising and swine raising, but with only partial 

 success. It is claimed that the conditions of 

 ■climate and food supply present no serious 

 obstacle to the success of sheep farming, but 

 the statistics of 1901 showed only 2,545 sheep 

 in the country. Swine raising has succeeded 

 better, but can not yet be spoken of as an es- 

 tablished industry of much importance, the 

 number of swine having remained in the 

 vicinity of 200,000 for several years. 



The principal agricultural products, named 

 in the order of their acreage, are rice, rye, 

 barley, wheat, beans, mulberries, sweet pota- 

 toes, millet, buckwheat, rape, red beans, Italian 

 millet, tea, indigo leaves, potatoes, sorghum. 



tobacco leaves, cotton and hemp. The area 

 devoted to rice cultivation constitutes a little 

 more than two fifths of the total area of arable 

 land. The greater part of the rice fields are in 

 low-lying land, which can be easily flooded, but 

 some upland rice is raised. Mulberry trees 

 and tea plants are usually planted on land not 

 suitable for more important crops, such as the 

 slopes of hills, sandy dunes, and similar places. 

 In the warmer parts of the Empire barley and 

 rape are often raised as a second crop after 

 rice has been harvested, but farther north the 

 excess of moisture required for rice leaves the 

 land too cold for another crop the same year. 

 Stock raising is still in its infancy in Japan, 

 and is not likely to become an important in- 

 dustry, owing to the high price of land and 

 the coarseness of the native grasses, most of 

 which are not fit for food for cattle or horses. 

 Oats and maize as foods for farm animals are 

 practically unknown, and what passes for hay 

 is a kind of straw, which is chopped fine be- 

 fore it is fed to horses. A little less than one 

 sixth of the arable land consists of plains and 

 pastures, and of this about two fifths belong 

 to the state and the imperial household, tlie 

 remainder being owned by private stock 

 raisers, who raise stock principally for tillage 

 and draft animals. The natives are not ac- 

 customed to the use of butter or miUv, and do 

 not usually like the taste of them, and their 

 religious prejiidices have hitherto prevented 

 the general use .of meat of any kind, although 

 they now seem to be developing a taste for all 

 these kinds of food. 



I'armers do not engage in poultry raising to 

 a sufficient extent to provide the eggs needed 

 for home consumption, these being imported 

 from China to the value of over $500,000 per 

 year. Emit raising, under the stimulus of 

 government encouragement, has advanced con- 

 siderably, but is not yet an important branch 

 of farming in this country. Bee culture is 

 engaged in to a limited extent, but the indus- 

 try is still in a primitive condition. 



TBE URBAN AND RURAL POPULATION OF 

 GREAT BRITAIN. 



The general report of the census of Great 

 Britain of 1901 has recently been issued. In 



