REPORT OF MR. FRANCIS H. APPLETON.
545
per hundred-weight and mile on railroads, highways and by water; the daily wages of the laborers; the discount on credit; the movement of purchases and leases. These should be officially ascertained or determined with proper accuracy, in the manner usual in the special countries. The proposals of the speaker were warmly seconded.
Prof. Dr. F. X. Neumann, of Vienna, governmental counsellor, speaking in praise of what had been said, also remarked that "the introduction of common agraria-statistical investigations, with the present organization of the cultivation of land and traffic in the produce of the soil, is no longer a theoretical matter, but one of practical signification. The knowledge or ignorance of these conditions affects the prosperity and misery of many millions of beings.” The speaker proves most minutely, by the example of grain traffic and the prices of rye, the results upon national economy which good or bad statistical investigations can produce.
In a lecture delivered by Dr. A. E. Brehm before the International Congress, on "Our treatment of the soil and the birds,” he says :—
“ It is not to be wondered at that, with a coincidence of favoring conditions, an increase of vermin can ensue which calls to mind the Egyptian plagues. On the other hand, we drive away, in many cases, utterly, the enemies of the vermin, and this too by our methods of cultivation, since we deprive them, if not of life, j T et of dwellings, i. e., of places for building their nests and breeding. It is seldom that we occupj' ourselves directly with the nurture of the injurious sorts, and the destruction of the useful ones ; but indirectly we protect the former and destroy the latter, without, however, giving the world the right to call us thoughtless or malicious. We keep one end and aim, to the exclusion of all others, before our eyes. This arises from lacking perception of what is right, not from intentional neglect of the existing conditions, and deserves to be excused, if not defended. Friendly and earnest instruction is therefore more appropriate than the reproaches which Gloger addresses to all cultivators of land and forest.”
He also says :—
“I must assert, that the direct persecution of our destroyers of vermin, resulting from the failure to recoguize their activity and 69