262 HITCHCOCK! STUDY of the local flora 



the engineer. And it should be as important to the writer of 

 scientific articles as to the writer of novels, essays, or philosoph- 

 ical papers. A lack of attention to such details as punctuation, 

 capitalization, and consistency in the abbreviation of biblio- 

 graphic titles, and still more to careful diction, may with some 

 justification be considered as indicating a similar lack of atten- 

 tion to details in carrying on the investigation which the paper 

 records. The author should examine and correct his own paper 

 with the same care and detached interest with which he, as an 

 editor, would go over the manuscript of another. It is an evi- 

 dence of scientific ability to be able to hold one's self firmly to 

 every detail of his task, drudgery though it be, from the pre- 

 liminary laying out of the plan of the work to the proper placing 

 of the last comma in the finished manuscript. 



At the beginning of his scientific career, every worker has 

 before him an ideal which is a guide and an inspiration, a meas- 

 ure of accomplishment. This guide is usually the published 

 paper of a prominent botanist, one in whom he has confidence 

 and who has fired his zeal. As he advances along his chosen 

 path he shifts his standard of accomplishment, but it should 

 be always above or beyond. No man is perfect; no man's 

 work is perfect. Only an ideal can be perfect. The axiom, 

 the whole is twice the half, is an abstract truth, a perfect ideal. 

 But we are never able to reach this ideal in practice. Our 

 most careful measurements fall a little short of exact mechanical 

 demonstration. The scientific worker progresses so long as his 

 ideal is well in advance, be it the work of a teacher or leader, 

 or be it abstract perfection toward which we all strive but which 

 we never reach. But so soon as his ideal is his own best work, 

 his progress ceases. 



I have endeavored to outline to you the advantages to be 

 gained in a study of some branch of taxonomic botany by those 

 members of the society who are officially engaged in investiga- 

 tions along other lines. The local flora offers abundant op- 

 portunity for advancing scientific knowledge and for self-train- 

 ing in scientific methods. It cannot be claimed that taxonomic 

 botany affords better opportunity for such training than does 



