171
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
Reference :-
PILICO.885/25
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO
f
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recent years in most countries. Additions and modifications are constantly being made, and it would be a duty of the Bureau to keep overseas workers informed of these.
15. Finally, there is a field of work in a direction which personal experience leads me to believe could be most usefully followed. The past isolation of many workers has led to much confusion as to the real identity and distribution of the parasites responsible for certain diseases, sometimes of major importance. What may really be the same parasite may be known by different names in different places, or different causes may be assigned to what is really the one disease. I need only refer to the phytophthoras attacking palms, rubber, and cacao, the sclerosporas on maize, sugar-cane, and millets, and the diplodias that attack branches and roots of tea, rubber, cacao, and the like. To clear up questions of this nature, the actual cultivation of the parasite under uniform artificial conditions is frequently Lecessary, and is a valuable corrective, where possible of application, to the results obtained from the comparison of dead specimens. This work is laborious, but I think it should be taken up as opportunity permits.
16. No doubt other lines on which the Bureau can be made more useful will be suggested. But to carry out the above proposals will absorb the energies of a staff which is either somewhat larger than was contemplated when the annual income was fixed at £2,000, or else has to be more highly paid than when the calculations were made.
17. In the rough budget which I have attached (Appendix II) for the con- sideration of the Committee, there are certain obvious omissions. Nothing has been proposed for rent since I do not know if rent is likely to be charged for the premises on Kew Green. There is nothing for cleaning the laboratory, but it seems doubtful if the laboratory attendant would be willing to do such work, and in any case his time will be fairly well taken up without it. There is nothing for insurance or furniture, and no reserve. Even so, the total exceeds the grant by £334. I do not know where it can be reduced without seriously diminishing the utility of the Bureau.
18. I shall require a well-trained and competent scientific assistant. The work is more than one man can deal with because we shall have to do so much ourselves, without being able to rely on the assistance of outside specialists. Once specimens begin to come in our time will be very largely taken up in determining them, as a single difficult specimen may entail several days' work. In the early days we shall get many undescribed species (my own collections in India have yielded about thirty per cent), and even as these become less frequent the total number received may be expected to increase. I have calculated the salary required for this officer after consulting various persons who are in touch with present conditions, and have suggested about the same as that proposed for junior assistants in the Imperial Bureau of Entomology.
19. A clerk and abstractor with a good knowledge of languages is very necessary for the work of preparing information in a form most useful to workers abroad. A great many papers will have to be abstracted and very complete indexes maintained. The salary proposed is slightly less than that proposed for the lady abstractors of the Imperial Bureau of Entomology.
20. A typist will be required to assist in correspondence and cataloguing. The salary proposed is approximately the same as that of the typists of the allied Bureau.
21. A laboratory attendant is a necessity for any laboratory of this nature. His duties will be the care of apparatus, preparation of media and reagents, and mounting of specimens. I am very doubtful whether the pay proposed is sufficient as I have not had time to go into the question fully.
22. A recurring sum of £50 is included for the purchase of apparatus and other fittings, and a similar sum for the library. These figures are as low as it seemed possible to make them and may have to be supplemented from the next item.
23. There is a sum of £100 proposed for general expenses as there are numerous petty items that will have to be paid for from this source, and it seems advisable to have something in hand for unexpected contingencies.
24. In addition to these items of recurring expenditure there are others which can best be met by lump sum grants, as I understand that the Bureau already has accumulated some funds. They are non-recurring charges for the equipment of the Bureau under three heads. The Library requires about £200 spent on certain expensive works of reference and other books that will be in constant use, about an
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equal sum will be required for apparatus (microscopes, microtome, incubators, sterilizers, glass ware, and the like), and some furniture will be necessary as a good deal that was in the Kew Green premises will go to Harpenden. I shall shortly be able to prepare detailed lists of requirements under these three headings for the Finance Committee.
E. J. BUTLER.
17, Kew Green,
20th October,
1920.
APPENDIX I.
Estimate of Cost of Running an Abstracting Journal.
The following figures of some of the charges incurred for the Review of Applied Entomology have been taken from the reports of the Director of the Imperial Bureau of Entomology.
£ 8. d. £ 8. d. 458 11 160 10 11
Review. Vol. III., 1915. Deficit on Printing and Publishing Translations for Review year ending 31st March, 1916
Review. Vol. IV., 1916. Deficit Printing and Publishing
(estimated)
Translations year ending 31st March, 1917
Review. Year ending 31st March, 1918, deficit Printing and
Publishing...
Review.
Translations same period
Half-year ending 30th September, 1918, deficit
Printing and Publishing Translations same period
Review. Half-year ending 30th September, 1919, deficit
Printing and Publishing. Translations same period
Current estimated deficit on Printing and Publishing
the Review per annum Current estimated fees for Translations per annum...
1
619 2 0
358 19 3 140 10 0
499 9 3
391 12 9
159 2 6
550 15 3
410 14 100 0 0
9
510 14 9 (half-year)
978 7
1
10 8 11
988 16 (half-year)
0
700 0 0 70 0 0
It will be seen, therefore, that the average net cost of printing and publishing, and fees to translators, for 1915 to 1917, was about £550 per annum, and the current cost is about £770.
To this must be added salaries of the staff engaged on the Review, which, when started in 1912, consisted of an assistant editor on £300, an assistant on £200, and a typist on £65. Three abstractors, a despatch clerk, an indexer, and a second typist were subsequently added, but some of these probably have other duties than those solely connected with the Review.
In endeavouring to estimate the cost of running an independent abstracting journal, I have taken the net printing and publishing charges at £400 per annum, for though the Review of Applied Entomology consists of two volumes (Series A (Agricultural) and Series B (Medical and Veterinary)) whereas we would only require one, the cost of the latter would be proportionally higher in such items as postage and the like, and the sales would be less, at least at first. For salaries, I have estimated £550 for an assistant editor, £145 for a correspondence clerk, and £600 for two abstractors with a good knowledge of languages. Translations have been estimated at £50. Nothing has been allowed for rent, warehousing of surplus stock, or furniture, as there should be sufficient room at the headquarters of the Bureau for publishing and storing, while the last can probably be confined to a lump grant from reserves.
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