700 The American Naturalist. [August, 
whose names will be announced later. The general scope of the jour- 
nal will remain unchanged, and a high standard will be maintained in 
every department. It is hoped that naturalists in all parts of the 
country will find the AMERICAN NATURALIST a convenient medium 
for such of their communications as may be of general interest to 
others working in the same general field, as well as to specialists in 
their own lines. Intending contributors are invited to send manu- 
` scripts directly to Dr. R. P. Bigelow, Massachusetts Institute of Tech- 
nology, Boston, Mass. 
THE meeting of the Association of Agricultural Colleges and Exper- 
iment Stations at Minneapolis, in the month just past, cannot fail to be 
productive of good. It brings out forcibly the endeavors of Ameri- 
cans asa people to ameliorate the conditions of the agricultural classes, 
reminding us, as it does, that some $1,890,000 were appropriated by 
Congress for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1898, for. agriculture. Of 
this something like $1,170,000 is for scientific investigations under the 
direct supervision of the Department of Agriculture, and the rest 
($720,000) for maintaining the experiment stations. The departmen- 
tal divisions falling within the domains covered by the American 
Naturalist receive various amounts as follows: Botany, $23,800; 
Agrostology, $18,100; Forestry, $28,520; Pomology, $14,500; Phy- 
siology and Vegetable Pathology, $26,500 ; Biological Survey, $27,560; 
Entomology, $29,500; the Bureau of Animal Industry, $755,640; and 
for special investigations in nutrition under the auspices of the office of 
Experiment Stations, $15,000. 
At this meeting, among the important matters brought to light was 
the relation between experimental and instructional work as it exists in 
some of the institutions represented in the Association. The complaint 
was made that experimental work suffers at the expense of instruc- 
tional through the overloading of the workers. Many a teacher who — 
should have some time to carry on original work is so crowded with 
class work that neither energy nor time is left for anything else. The 
result is that those whom he is supposed to teach are forced back, more 
or less, into the old parrot methods of learning, lacking as they do that 
best of incentive to a development of their own powers, namely, the 
living example of an original worker constantly turning out 
work. 
Another matter of importance that was touched upon is the indexing 
of literature relating to agriculture. So far as matter emanating from 
the experiment stations is concerned, nothing better could be asked for 
than the Experiment Station Record. But there is needed an index 
