THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE 



205 



THE PEOGEESS OF SCIENCE 



THE BUREAU OF SCIENCE OF 

 THE PHILIPPINE ISLANDS 



The annual report of the acting 

 director of the Bureau of Science, 

 maintained under the government of 

 the Philippine Islands, for the year 

 ending with July, 1912, has just 

 reached this country, and bears witness 

 to the accomplishment of a consider- 

 able amount of scientific work. It 

 might be better if the native peoples 

 were permitted to follow their natural 

 lines of development, but scientific in- 

 vestigation and the common schools are 

 probably better for them than the rule 

 of the Spanish friars. In any ease, the 

 serious efforts made by the Bureau of 

 Science to investigate the natural his- 

 tory and natural resources of the 

 islands and the tropical diseases that 

 occur there will be of value to the 

 world at large. Government and in- 

 vestigations in a tropical country, how- 

 ever, can be carried forward only at a 

 heavy cost, and we should probably 

 adopt the English policy of paying 

 large salaries and permitting early 

 retirement on a pension. 



The present report gives evidence of 

 the difficulty of maintaining a scien- 

 tific staff. Dr. Paul C. Freer, director 

 of the Bureau of Science from the time 

 of its organization as the Bureau of 

 Government Laboratories in the year 

 1901, dean of the college of medicine, 

 and professor of chemistry in the Uni- 

 versity of the Philippines, died last 

 year. The important work that he 

 accomplished in advancing science and 

 education was thus paid for at a heavy 

 price. Several others of the most ac- 

 tive workers in the bureau have re- 

 turned to the United States, and just 

 now Dr. Richard P. Strong, chief of 

 the biological laboratory, has accepted 

 a chair of tropical medicine in the 

 Harvard Medical School. 



During the year a new wing was 

 added to the laboratory building, as 

 shown in the foreground of the accom- 



panying illustration. The division of 

 mines, the sections of fisheries and 

 ornithology, the entomological section 

 and laboratories and the library were 

 I moved into it. The room in the main 

 building vacated by the library now 

 contains the herbarium, and other 

 rooms left vacant by the readjustments 

 are occupied by laboratories and for 

 clerical work. 



The amount of research work accom- 

 plished by the bureau is born witness 

 to by The Philippine Journal of Sci- 

 ence, established by Dr. Freer. It is 

 published in four sections — one devoted 

 to the chemical and geological sciences 

 and to the industries, one to tropical 

 medicine, one to botany and one to 

 general biology, ethnology and anthro- 

 pology. During the year under review, 

 there were published in these sections 

 of the journal about one hundred ar- 

 ticles, most of them by members of 

 the staff of the Bureau of Science. 

 Among the work published or to be 

 published in the Journal may be noted 

 the proceedings of the International 

 Plague Conference at Mukden in 1911, 

 of which Dr. Strong and Dr. Teague 

 were members. Experiments have been 

 carried on in several directions, in- 

 cluding work on beri-beri, surra and 

 entamcebic dysentery. In the botanical 

 section additions have been made to 

 the herbarium which now numbers over 

 100,000 specimens, but apparently no 

 very great amount of field work has 

 been done. The division of entomol- 

 ogy has done economic work in pro- 

 moting silk culture and has carried on 

 campaigns to exterminate the mosquito 

 and other disease-bearing insects. The 

 section of fisheries has studied shells 

 used in the manufacture of buttons, 

 tortoise shells, the shark-fin industry 

 and the manufacture of leather from 

 the skins of marine animals. Some- 

 thing, but apparently not much, has 

 been accomplished in stocking the 

 streams with game fish and in the 



