144 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN. 



What does investigation mean? It does not mean any 

 thing which is of necessity capable of practical application 

 at first sight. The investigator is a dull, plodding mortal, 

 working away year by year. But at last he discovers 

 something which is of benefit to all mankind. You should 

 not hurry the* investigator and say, *' We must have a re- 

 port in six months." ** We must have a report in a year." 

 " Tell us about this thing, about that thing, about the other 

 thing." An investigator is one who knows what he is 

 about, and he knows a great deal better than you do. He 

 is one who has been trained, who has studied deeply, who is 

 thoroughly in earnest. He is not one who is making money 

 but one who is bound to discover the truth, and the truth 

 is what we want. 



The weak point of science in the United States has al- 

 ways been not that we have not energetic men, not that 

 we are without talented men, but that the men are not al- 

 lowed to turn to abstract study for the simple reason that 

 the American mind does not encourage abstractions. But 

 we know what Newton did. Gravitation was an abstraction. 

 The germ theory also was an abstraction, and we know 

 what practical results have come from abstract studies in 

 these cases. Here in St. Louis, better than anywhere else, 

 you are provided for doing abstract work. Trust to re- 

 search. Do not be afraid to go ahead and leave to investiga- 

 tors the work which, in the end, and perhaps in a compar- 

 atively few years, must give your Garden a prominent 

 place amongst all the Gardens of the world. Do not be 

 content to say, "We of St. Louis have here a beautiful Gar- 

 den, where we can go every day and examine the plants and 

 appreciate the beauties of nature," but do not rest until 

 you have established here a school of research, research in the 

 most difficult problems of botany, being assured that in the 

 end those problems will be of advantage not only to St. 

 Louis, to Missouri, but to the whole world. Once havino^ 

 made in St. Louis a school of research, you will then take 

 the lead in practical horticulture as well as in more purely 



