38 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. XII. No. 286 



opened on the day appointed, Tuesday, July 17. The exercises 

 were o£ the simplest and most informal character, as no programme 

 had been arranged and no ceremonies were expected or desired. 

 Nevertheless, several members of the Board of Trustees, a few stu- 

 dents, and a half dozen or more of guests were present, and spent 

 the morning in examining the new building and its equipment, and 

 in visiting the laboratories and aquaria of the United States Fish 

 ■Commission. At two o'clock the whole party dined at Gardiner 

 ■Cottage, — the domestic headquarters of the new enterprise, — 

 "which a generous citizen of Wood's Holl, Mr. J. S. Fay, has kindly 

 put at the disposal of the trustees. Shortly after three o'clock the 

 Director, Dr. C. O. Whitman, delivered in the laboratory an open- 

 ing address upon the history and functions of marine biological 

 laboratories, referring especially to the Penikese School and to Pro- 

 fessor Baird's labors in this direction. It is earnestly to be hoped 

 that this address, which seemed to those who heard it unusually 

 thoughtful and adequate, may be printed. Professor C. S. Minot 

 then said a few words on behalf of the trustees, and the exercises 

 were over. The trustees appear to have done wisely in deciding to 

 make a beginning this year, for, notwithstanding the fact that the 

 announcements were not made until most students and investiga- 

 tors had formed their plans for the summer, some eight or ten stu- 

 dents are already at work in the laboratory. The responses from 

 •colleges and from students make it certain that another year will 

 witness here a large and enthusiastic gathering of investigators and 

 students in biology. The building appears to be admirably adapted 

 to its purposes. It is plainly but strongly built, of wood, two sto- 

 ries high, and with a pitched roof. The roof and sides are covered 

 with shingles, unpainted. There is a commodious and convenient 

 basement under the western half of the building, intended for stor- 

 age, for the safe keeping of alcohol, boats, oars, and the like. The 

 lower floor of the laboratory is intended for beginners, and for 

 teachers and students who are learners but not investigators. The 

 upper story is for investigators only. The equipment includes 

 work-tables, specially designed, and placed before the large and nu- 

 merous windows. Each student is provided with a Leitz micro- 

 scope, a set of re-agents, watch-glasses, dissecting pans, and the 

 dishes and other things indispensable to good work. The labora- 

 tory owns boats, dredges, nets, and other tools for collecting. A 

 small library has been provided, and, under the progressive and 

 efficient management of Dr. C. O. Whitman and Mr. B. H. Van 

 Vleck, a season that promises to be highly successful, and most 

 important in the history of American biology, has been aus- 

 piciously begun. 



THE NEW DEPARTMENT OF LABOR. 



The President's signature, July 11, of the legislative bill contain- 

 ing the appropriations for the new Department of Labor has com- 

 pleted the establishment of Col. Carroll D. Wright's bureau on a 

 permanent and firm footing. The re-organization has, it is true, 

 been more nominal than real. The force of men has not been in- 

 creased, but a large number of clerks and experts who were for- 

 merly on the temporary roll have been transferred to the permanent 

 one. The effect of this upon the character of the work they will 

 do in the future is expected to be very beneficial. They have been 

 trained for their work, but the uncertainty of their tenure of office 

 — the danger that they might at any time have been dismissed by 

 a failure of Congress to appropriate money for their salaries — has 

 not encouraged them to work with that zeal that it is expected that 

 they will manifest now that their permanent employment is pro- 

 vided for by the organic law of the Department of Labor. These 

 remarks should not be construed as a criticism of the work of the 

 temporary employees of the Bureau of Labor, for it is not open to 

 such criticism, but to show the inevitable tendency and influence of 

 uncertainty of tenure of office upon the work of any class of men, 

 and the expected effect of permanency. 



The scope of the work of the new Department of Labor is not 

 much greater than that of the Bureau which it succeeds, but, un- 



der the new law, the Commissioner is directed to pursue certain 

 lines of investigation which he pursued before only by authority of 

 appropriations made from time to time, and which there was dan- 

 ger that some economically disposed Congress might now and then 

 omit. 



The Department of Labor is now engaged in making inquiries 

 in three directions. The investigation to ascertain the economic, 

 social, and moral condition of the working women of the leading 

 cities of the country, which has been in progress for several 

 months, is substantially completed, and its results will be set forth 

 in the next annual report of the department to be presented to the 

 President ne.xt December. The inquiry in regard to marriages and 

 divorces is also substantially finished. This will be the subject of 

 a special report, which will also be published about the time Con- 

 gress meets next winter. A great amount of material bearing 

 upon the condition of the railway employees of the-country has al- 

 ready been accumulated in the department, and the work in this 

 line of inquiry is progressing very rapidly, so that the report will 

 be ready for the printer about next December. 



This railroad inquiry has been pursued along two lines. The 

 agents of the Department of Labor are gathering all the data to 

 show the material and social condition of the railroad men of the 

 country, their hours of labor, tours of duty, styles of living, bene- 

 ficial organizations, etc. But Colonel Wright desires to embody in 

 this report not only the rates of wages which are paid to these men, 

 but also how much they actually earn in a year after all lost time 

 has been deducted, and why the time is lost. The only way in 

 which this information could be obtained was by an examination of 

 the pay-rolls of the different railroads of the country. In most in- 

 stances the railway officials have promptly and cheerfully responded 

 to Colonel Wright's request by sending to Washington their pay- 

 rolls for a year. Not one railroad company has refused to allow 

 its pay-rolls to be examined, although some have preferred that the 

 tabulations be made in their own offices. This report will be of 

 especial interest in view of the frequent controversies between rail- 

 road managements and employees. It will show whether, as a 

 whole, the railroad men of the country are required to work more 

 or fewer hours than other workingmen, what their annual earnings 

 are, and what is their social condition. 



The inquiry provided for in the organic law of the Department 

 of Labor in regard to " the cost of producing articles that are duti- 

 able in the United States, in leading countries where such articles 

 are produced, by fully specified units of production, and under a 

 classification showing the different elements of cost, or approximate 

 cost, of such articles of production, including the wages paid in such 

 industries per day, week, month, or year, or by the piece ; and 

 hours employed per day ; and the profits of the manufacturers and 

 producers of such articles ; and the comparative cost of living, and 

 the kind of living," will be begun next fall, and the report will be 

 ready for submission to the Fifty-first Congress at the opening of 

 its first session. Statistics of this kind, in the honesty and impar- 

 tiality of which representatives of both political parties had confi- 

 dence, as they have in all statistics to which Colonel Wright puts 

 his name, would have been of incalculable value in the tariff debate 

 that is now in progress. Scores of members of Congress have ap- 

 plied at the Labor Bureau for just such figures as this inquiry will 

 furnish. 



Colonel Wright thinks that one of the most important provisions 

 of the organic act of the Department of Labor is that in which he 

 is •' specially charged to investigate the causes of, and facts relating 

 to, all controversies and disputes between employers and employees 

 as they may occur, and which may tend to interfere with the wel- 

 fare of the people of the different States." Experience has shown 

 that it has been almost impossible, even for the sharpest newspaper 

 reporters, to ascertain, when a great strike occurs, which side is in 

 the right and which is in the wrong, or how far each is right and each 

 wrong. The employers state their side of the dispute, concealing 

 any thing that may be unfavorable to them, and the employees do 

 the same. If the exact facts could be known to the public, popular 

 sentiment would very soon decide which was right and which was 

 wrong, and the latter would have to yield to this sentiment without 

 much delay. 



The Department of Labor has the machinery for gathering the 



