FIRST ANNUAL BANQUET. 125 



The Chairman then called upon Professor William Tre- 

 lease, the Director of the Missouri Botanical Garden, as 

 follows: — 



It has already been stated, gentlemen, that the chief 

 purposes of this Trust are educational and scientific. The 

 will which created it provides that the Director of the Gar- 

 den shall " employ his energies that from year to year the 

 institution under his charge shall grow up in efficiency in 

 promoting the ends in view in its inception." 



Professor Trelease, the Director of the Garden, whom 

 we have the pleasure of having with us this evening, was a 

 pupil of Dr. Asa Gray, a name honored by all votaries of 

 Science, not only of Botanical Science, but of Natural 

 Science in its widest sense. Four years ago, upon the 

 recommendation of Dr. Gray, as well as his own con- 

 viction of its appropriateness, Mr. Shaw nominated Dr. 

 Trelease as Professor of the School of Botany, with the 

 purpose that when the proper time should come he should 

 be appointed the Director of the Garden,— a duty which 

 the Trustees promptly and gladly fulfilled. In his hands 

 chiefly rests, as I have already said, the development of the 

 institution. 



You will join me, gentlemen, in wishing all success and 

 usefulness to the Missouri Botanical Garden. I have the 

 great pleasure of asking Prof essor Trelease to tell us some- 

 thing of its promise, of the plans which have been adopted 

 and of the work which he has so well begun. 



MR. TRELEASE. 



There is one branch of Botany, Mr. Chairman, that I have 

 never cultivated very much,— the one my friend Mr. Hitch- 

 cock referred to, and that has been so fully exemplified in 

 what has been said already, — that branch relating to the 

 flowers of speech. However, there are a few plain botan- 



