plants, and the inspection conditions to be observed. If this be done an 
assurance could be given on behalf of England that the inspections would 
be strictly carried out and the certificates granted in a careful and con- 
scientious manner. Furthermore, if the Federal Horticultural Board is 
not able to accept the statements as to the improvement of the British 
Pathological Service in recent years, England would welcome a delega- 
tion from America to investigate the Service first-hand and to work out 
a system for the certification of plants. 
Complete Pathological Safety Unattainable 
While it is true that the most important factor in carrying pests 
from one country to another is the trade in living plants, yet this trade 
is by no means the only factor. Many kinds of insects and also fungus 
spores are able to persist for periods, long or short as the case may be, 
away from their host plants and they are thus able to take advantage of 
any means of transport which may exist. Plant quarantine, therefore, is 
a means of reducing risks, not of eliminating them. 
Since it is manifestly impossible to eliminate all risks, the problem 
resolves itself into one of weighing the risk of the introduction of foreign 
pests against the loss in trade due to quarantine measures of various de- 
grees of stringency. 5 
Pathologists and entomologists in England have for the last ten years 
looked with growing fear at the risks involved by the importation of 
American produce. They would prefer an absolute prohibition of the 
import of all American plants and temperate fruit. They have, how- 
‘ ever, been deterred by the certainty that such a prohibition, which, it 
is logical to suppose would become operative on both sides of the ocean, 
would involve a serious reduction in trade, and that the premium the 
country would have to pay for additional security would be too great. 
General Prohibition Sought, but Undesirable 
Now, however, that America has declared herself to be aiming at the 
prohibition of all plant imports (in ordinary trade at all events) the 
above argument loses its force, and pathologists are again asking them- 
selves why England should continue to run risks without receiving any 
compensation by way of trade. 
This argument, at all events as regards fruit, is a disappering one, 
but in any case it is countered by a totally different consideration, viz., 
there are other countries from which can be obtained the categories of 
plants now imported from the U. 8. A., and these countries have no pro- 
hibition on English exports. It is clearly preferable then, since risks 
must anyhow be taken, to deal with a country open to English trade 
rather than with one which will not risk English produce. 
British Attitude Not One of Reprisal. 
There is no question of reprisals in this argument. A reprisal is 
the carrying out of something, in itself purposeless and undesirable, in 
order to compel another party to make a concession. Here we ask no con- 
cession and our action will stand on its own merits as desirable. We 
merely assert our rights to deal with our risks in the manner most advan- 
tageous to our country. It is, in fact, purely a business transaction in 
pathology. 
Additional copies of this pamphlet can be obtained from the A. T. DeLa Mare 
Co., 448 W. 37th Street, New York. Price on application. 
19 
