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Before it was known that the Phytopathological Commission would not assemble, the Sub-Committee recommended that the Bureau should send a representative to accompany the British delegates on the Commission. Sir Edward Grey, whq was approached by the Colonial Office, stated that after consulting the Board of Agricul- ture and, Fisheries he saw no objection to this proposal. But as soon as it was known that the Commission was indefinitely postponed, a letter was written by the Colonial Office to the Foreign Office saying that the Secretary of State considered it desirable that the Bureau should be represented at the General Assembly at Rome this month; that he understood that no objection existed to this proposal; that Mr. Marshall would be selected as the Bureau's representative, and that he would presumably go in the capacity of Assessor to the British delegates. The Foreign Office reply has now been received. From this it appears that the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries see no objection to the proposal, but that as the Commis- sion on Phytopathology has fallen through they do not expect that the General Assembly will be prepared to deal with the question of international action on plant disease, and that they are accordingly not sending any specialist from their Depart- It has also been ascertained from ment to Rome to advise in this connexion.

Sir Sydney Olivier, the British delegate to the General Assembly, that while ques- tions might arise on which he would be glad to have Mr. Marshall's advice, it would not be possible for our representative to go in the capacity of an Assessor. Assessors, he states, have no official position in the scheme of the General Assembly, and Mr. Marshall would either have to go as a British delegate or would have to be admitted into the Assembly (possibly with others) by a special resolution. What line the Assembly would take on such a question there is no means of judging.

It is therefore necessary for the Committee to consider to-day whether, in view of the facts which I have placed before them, it is still thought desirable that the Bureau should seek to send a representative to Rome for the General Assembly.

Annexure 3 to No. 1.

REPORT OF THE DIRECTOR.

Although actually inaugurated at an earlier date, from a purely financial standpoint the Imperial Bureau of Entomology came into existence on the 1st April, 1913, that being the date from which the contributing Government have agreed to support the organisation for a period of three years. Therefore, the accounts now submitted for the year ending the 31st March last are treated as being those of the Entomological Research Committee only.

In the statement of receipts and expenditure for the whole year, it will be observed that a large deficit of £1,200 is shown. This is mainly due to the fact that the annual grant of £1,000 from the Imperial Treasury was not paid over to the Crown Agents until the 31st March, and does not appear in their books until the 1st April. The true deficit is, therefore, only £200, and is attributable to the extra expenditure involved in starting the work of the Bureau, which must be estimated at not less than £350. Towards this we have received a sum of £150 from the West Indian Colonies, all of which have paid their contributions. for the year 1912-13, except Jamaica and British Guiana. The sum of £225 paid towards the cost of an Entomologist in the Federated Malay States is also a special and non-recurrent item; so that our actual expenditure in connection with tropical Africa was more than £200 below our revenue. The amount charged to scientific equipment is unusually high owing to a special payment of £150 to the Nyasaland Government towards the cost of Mr. Neave's permanent camp and laboratory on Mount Mlanje. The item for establishment charges includes six months' rent for the rooms in Elvaston Place, together with the cost of cleaning, fires, lighting, &c.

In spite of the additional calls which have been made upon the funds of the Research Committee, it will be seen from the general financial statement that there When the Finance Sub-Committee were still remains a reserve balance of £708.

arranging the methods for allocating the funds in future, the treatment of any such balance was not considered. The question therefore arises as to whether this sum is to be merged in the general funds of the Bureau, or whether it should be kept as a reserve to meet any special expenditure that may seem necessary connection with tropical Africa.

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A satisfactory start has now been made with the publication of the "Review of Applied Entomology," though difficulty is still being experienced in getting the printers to have it ready by the allotted time. Judging by letters which have been received, the journal is highly appreciated in many quarters, and especially so in the United States. Dr. Hewitt also has written saying that they are all very pleased with it in Canada, and send their congratulations that we have attained so successful a result in so short a time. The Bureau is certainly fortunate in having obtained the services of so competent and hard-working an assistant as Mr. North, who has been unsparing in his efforts to make the publication a success.

Our attempts to obtain periodicals in exchange have proved a little disappoint- ing so far. Over 400 specimen copies of the Review were sent out for this purpose, and up to the present only 75 exchanges have been arranged.

But additional acceptances are still slowly coming in, and it is to be hoped that this number will be very materially increased, as such exchanges should constitute our principal source of information. In the case of Russia we have had great difficulty in ascertaining even the names of journals that are likely to be useful to us; but lately, thanks to the courteous assistance of Professor Wladimiroff, we have got into touch with a number of publications, and we have actually arranged more exchanges with Russia than with any other country except the United States.

In many cases the failure to respond is due to the fact that the journals are not connected with any library, so that exchanges are of no value to them. It is clear, therefore, that we may have to subscribe to any of such journals as may be of importance to us, though no provision was made for this in the original estimates. Another method, however, is worth consideration. The editor of the American Journal of Economic Entomology" has refused to exchange, but offers to send us his periodical regularly if we will insert in ours an advertisement of each number; and, further, he will himself advertise our Review. This offer had to be refused, as at the Conference of August, 1912, it was decided that no advertise- ments should be inserted in the Review. The Committee is therefore asked to reconsider this question, so far as the advertisement of books and periodicals is concerned, for it is possible that by this means we may be able to obtain at little cost publications which we should otherwise have to purchase.

In connection with articles in Russian, it has been found by no means easy to devise a definite scale of payment for translations, and the Committee will be asked to consider a suggestion for a regular weekly payment to the translator. A similar difficulty will probably arise with regard to Japanese papers.

We have failed to make any satisfactory arrangement for translations in this country, so I have written to Professor Sasaki, in Tokio, to ask whether it would be possible to have the abstracts prepared in Japan by a competent man.

As might be expected, comparatively few subscribers have been secured as yet. Writing on the 23rd April, Messrs. Dulau and Company state that they have received only 54 subscriptions for Series A and 65 for Series B.

Unfortunately we have lost the services of Mr. Gilbert Storey, who left on the 12th April, having been appointed to an entomological post in Egypt. To take his place, Mr. Ealand was engaged on the 21st April at £160 a year. Some time ago the Finance Sub-Committee authorised the engagement of an assistant who could help Mr. North with the work of abstracting, but it was not easy to secure a suitable man. Mr. Koeppern was finally engaged for this purpose on the 21st April, also at a salary of £160. The Committee is asked to approve these two appointments.

Owing to the help of our two Entomological Assistants, Mr. Veitch and Mr. Storey, the work of identifying collections received has been brought right up to date, at least so far as the insects can be named in the British Museum. During the quarter 13,000 specimens were received, of which 3.200 were blood-suckers and about 500 were insects of agricultural importance. The number of contributors has again risen, being 48, as compared with 37 in the two previous quarters. Of Jese 48, 39 are resident in tropical Africa and five in the West Indies, the remainder being in South Africa, Egypt, and Mauritius.

In order to give some idea of the extent of our work in this direction, it may be mentioned that during the past financial year 175 lists of identifications were sent out to 98 different correspondents, involving nearly 2,000 specific identifications.

As will be seen in the general financial statement, there is an unexpended balance in our Carnegie Fund of £1,448. At a recent meeting of the Selection Sub- Committee the following candidates were selected for Carnegie Scholarships:

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