PHARMACAL PLANTS AND THEIR CULTURE. 
19 
In most instances, a certain amount of garden plat and more exten- 
sive field experimenting is necessary to determine the best commercially 
operative methods of procedure, even after being fully informed as to 
the experimental and commercial operations which may have been 
carried out successfully in other states or in foreign countries. It is, 
indeed, important to know how belladonna is grown in Germany, in 
England, and in the eastern United States, but the methods as em- 
ployed in those countries do not apply in detail to Californian conditions. 
The purely experimental work should be done in botanical gardens 
created for that purpose. The experimental work in such gardens 
should be dominated by an economical, practical method. All of the 
other features should be made subsidiary. In other words, the botanical 
garden should have an economically commercial significance. Its chief 
function should be to develop the economic botanical resources of the 
country. To this end, the garden should be divided into two distinct 
parts. In one should be carried on the purely experimental work — 
that is, experimental work having a practical significance. In the 
second part should be carried on test plantings on a practically economic 
commercial basis. Such gardens need not be large nor expensive, and 
they should be distributed geographically and climatologically, in order 
that the greatest good might be accomplished with a minimum of 
expenditure. The idea is in the main carried out by Kew with its sub- 
stations and by the experimental stations of the United States Depart- 
ment of Agriculture, excepting that the mistake is made of controlling 
substations from one central point. In fact, as far as the United States 
are concerned, each State should support, direct, and control its own 
experimental work, with, of course, a cooperative relationship with the 
experimental gardens or stations of other states. A very efficient state 
garden of this kind does not require more than ten acres of ground, a 
propagating house, a tool shed, an office with store rooms, a competent 
director, one technical assistant, two or three skilled gardeners, and the 
necessary additional equipment. The annual cost of maintaining such 
a garden in high operative efficiency need not exceed $10,000. The 
financial gain to the State to be derived from such a garden would soon 
amount to millions of dollars annually. From five to twenty-five prac- 
tical tests should be carried on at one time, and perhaps two or three 
tests would be concluded each year. No time and effort should be 
wasted on useless things, as botanical freaks, botanical curios, purely 
technical research without practical significance, theoretical research 
and experiments, etc. Neither should time and effort be wasted on 
simple experiments which can be done by any agriculturist in any field 
or garden. Also, such gardens must be in charge of competent directors, 
men who by technical training and practical experience are qualified 
to direct such experiments as will bring practical net results in the 
shortest possible time. 
