The first biennial report of the State Conservation Commission is one of unusual interest. Through a law of 1915 this commission (consisting of three commissioners and a secretary) succeeded to the powers and duties of the Forestry Board, State Park Board, Conservation Commission, Commissioners of Fisheries, and the State Fish and Game Warden Department. The purpose was to consolidate “all the closely related duties and problems of administration over forest and stream, fish and game, and to give powerful impetus to the conservation of the natural resources of the Badger State.” The result has been a notable increase in efficiency and economy. The change, it may be noted, dispensed with the services of twenty-two members of boards and commissions. A strict civil service régime has been inaugurated. The report contains a considerable number of papers and division reports dealing with the conditions, problems, constructive plans and achievements which are shaping the conservation movement in the state. A large number of admirably chosen illustrations show the richness, variety, and beauty of the resources of nature in Wisconsin. These pictures enhance the value of a report which contains information of peculiar interest and significance to the people of the state. The biennial report of the secretary of state is largely a collection of financial statistics covering the fiscal years ending June 30, 1915 and June 30, 1916. The condition of all state funds, receipts and disbursements, the net disbursements of the state, the valuation of taxable property in the counties, and the apportionment of tax and special charges for 1914 and 1915, collected in 1915, are shown in detailed statements, and various tabular statements. Part four of the ninth annual report of the Railroad Commission is an elaborate collection of financial and operating statistics of railroad companies for the period from June 30, 1914 to June 30, 1915. The report is divided into three parts: steam railroads, electric railways, and express companies. There are 234 closely printed pages of statistical tables and figures, which lay bare with utmost exactness and detail all phases of the finances and operations of the three classes of public carriers mentioned. The statistics are not confined merely to Wisconsin; for example, the tables exhibiting the income account of steam railroads for the year ending December 31, 1914, show first the accounts of interstate roads in Wisconsin, and thereafter the records of the entire systems of interstate roads which operate in Wisconsin.