TWENTIETH ANNUAL REPORT OF THE DIRECTOR. 31 



utilized in class work. An amplification of the scope of the 

 chair of botany into that of a real school of botany rests 

 logically on the specific authorization of Mr. Shaw's will in 

 connection with enlargement of the research activities of the 

 Garden. It is a matter for congratulation that the enormous 

 burden of special taxation, which has thus far so greatly 

 hampered the Trustees in every direction, is likely to be lifted 

 within the next five or six years — through comj^letion of the 

 city improvements for which unproductive revenue property 

 is taxable. It should be possible, then, to make the School 

 of Botany in fact what it is now in name, within at most a 

 decade. No extension of the activities of the Garden is likely 

 to yield so large or significant results as arc to bo anticipated 

 from a Faculty of botany devoted to research and guiding 

 younger investigators in utilizing the Garden equipment. 



While financial conditions have thus far made it impossible 

 for the School of Botany to undertake much beyond meet- 

 ing the undergraduate botanical needs of the University, 

 these have been fully met. With the personal approval of 

 Mr. Shaw, an evening course in medical bacteriology was con- 

 ducted in the j^ears 1888-9 and 1889-90, — paving the way for 

 such courses in the medical schools of the city; and special 

 laboratory and lecture instruction in various other branches 

 of botany has been given from time to time. Applicants for 

 graduate standing have also been given opportunity for such 

 work as lay within their powers and the equipment of the 

 University and the Garden; and, though few in number, the six 

 persons who have earned the Master's degree and the nine 

 who have earned the Doctor's degree, with botany as a major 

 subject, have demonstrated by subsequent achievement the 

 value of the training that they have received, even under 

 existing conditions. 



In the year just closed, the undergraduate work of the 

 School of Botany has essentially repeated that of the preceding 

 year * At the opening of the current College year, Mr. Arno 

 Nehrling was appointed to the position of Assistant, which 

 Mr. W. A. Kuth had filled last year. 



* A list of electives offered, is given in Rept. Mo. Bot. Gard. 19 : 20. 



