Preface xiii. 
required, an expert, as described above, should 
be permanently appointed to, and reside in 
the colony, with a suitably equipped scientific 
institute placed at his disposal, in which further 
investigations and experiments could be carried 
out and checked.” 
Dr. Schulte is quite right, and perhaps up to 
a certain point it can be claimed that such work 
can be carried out in some of our colonies, but 
not sufficiently to give confidence to those who 
wish to see an assured success in view before 
they send out their sons to take up planting, 
or entrust their capital to ventures run by 
other people’s sons. Such investigations once 
started and discussed as those reported in the 
forthcoming pages must satisfy no one, they 
are only intended to point the way to further 
research, but that way is, I fear, too intricate 
and costly for individual action to carry 
out all such investigations to their uttermost 
point of finality. To do that we need a centre 
or centres of learning which will stand in 
relation to the plant world on the same lofty 
plane that hospitals do with human beings, 
that is to say we need agricultural colleges in 
the Tropics to train plant-doctors and experts 
overseas, as we have long had to train physi- 
cians and doctors over here. 
As things now are, whilst the public get the 
benefit of cheaper tea, &c., and the Exchequer 
scoops in its millions of revenue therefrom, the 
planter is left alone to discover how he can 
