40 
things which will probably appear in the Annual Report of the Department, hut it 
may lie that the oral statement of them will he more intelligible than the written, 
and will open the way for questions and suggestions from members of this convention 
either at this time or in informal conversations or otherwise hereafter. 
During the fiscal year ending June 30, 1894, the office issued 24 documents, aggregat- 
ing 2,089 pages. These include 12 numbers of the Experiment Station Record Avith 
index, 6 bulletins, 2 farmers' bulletins, and 4 circulars. In these publications, with 
one or two exceptions, the work of the individual experiment stations was compiled 
for distribution throughout this country and the rest of the civilized world. The 
fifth volume of the Experiment Station Record comprises 1,196 pages and contains 
abstracts of 267 bulletins and 43 annual reports of 55 experiment stations in the 
United States, and 67 publications of the Department of Agriculture. The total 
number of pages in these publications is 17,161. There are also 227 abstracts of 
reports of foreign investigations. The total number of titles abstracted is 973, classi- 
fied as follows: Chemistry, 46; botany, 42; bacteriology, 4 ; zoology, 6; mineralogy, 
1; meteorology, 36; water and soils, 36; fertilizers, 72; field crops, 155; horticulture, 
84; forestry, 10; seeds, 16; weeds, 8; diseases of plants, 66; entomology, 74; foods and 
animal production, 119; veterinary science, 18; dairying, 89; agricultural engineer- 
ing, 18; technology, 4; and statistics, 69. Classified lists of titles of foreign articles 
not abstracted are also given in each number. The aggregate number of titles thus 
reported is 1,514. Special articles contributed by eminent foreign workers in agri- 
cultural science were translated in the office and published in the Record. 
A notable feature of the fifth volume of the Record is a review of recent work in 
dairying, prepared by Dr. Allen, assistant director, which serves to show how large 
and important a feature of experiment station work investigations on dairying are. 
In the preparation of the Record constant effort has been made to condense the 
abstracts as far as practicable, and as a result they have become increasingly techni- 
cal as regards their language and form of statement. In spite of this the demand 
for the Record from intelligent farmers has steadily increased, and the number of 
commendations which it has received from persons without scientific knowledge has 
been surprisingly large. An edition of 8,000 copies is now required to meet the regu- 
lar demand for this publication. When the cards were recently sent out asking the 
persons on the mailing list whether they wished to receive the next volume of the 
Record, almost all of them returned an affirmative answer. Of course no such cards 
were sent to college and station officers. The Record is now regularly sent to a large 
number of the foreign experiment stations and other institutions engaged in agri- 
cultural investigations. In the sixth volume of the Record all the abstracts have 
been arranged under one series of topics. This enables us to make a more thorough 
classification of our material and to get more in the same space. We have at the 
same time enlarged the scope of the Record by securing the cooperation of the scien- 
tific bureaus and divisions of the Department, and the abstract committee of the 
Association of Official Agricultural Chemists. It is hoped that by this means we 
shall be able to present a comprehensive summary of the investigations in agricul- 
tural science throughout the world. 
The Handbook of Experiment Station Work, in which the work of all the stations 
in this country for about twenty years was summarized, has proved to be a popular 
document, the demand- for it having greatly outrun the ability of the Department to 
meet it. We still hope that Congress may be induced to issue a large edition for 
general distribution. This publication has, it is believed, helped to impress Con- 
gress and the country that the experiment stations have accomplished much work 
that is useful to farmers in all parts of the Union and are institutions which should 
be generously supported by States and nation. 
A general view of our system of agricultural education and research has been 
presented in the bulletin entitled " Organization Lists," and in the annual report of 
the office. I am aware that the preparation of these bulletins has involved con- 
siderable labor on the part of the station and college officers who had to collate the 
