THE PLANT WORLD, 



A MONTHLY JOURNAL OF POPULAR BOTANY. 



F. H. KNOWLTON, Ph. D., Editor, U. S. National Museum, Washington, D. C. 



ARTICLES AND NOTES ON ANY SUBJECT OF INTEREST TO PLANT-LOVERS ARE SOLICITED, AND SHOULD 



BE ADDRESSED TO THE EDITOR. 



Subscription Price, $1.00 per annum. <^ Advertising Rates upon Application. 



WILLARD N. CLUTE & CO., Publishers, - - BINGHAMTON, N. Y. 



The word amateur is often applied as a mark of reproach to those 

 who are unskilled or mere dabblers in an art or science. More cor- 

 rectly it should be applied to one who pursues a subject from taste or 

 attachment, without a view to gain; in other words from the mere 

 love of it. The botanist who is called an amateur in this latter sig- 

 nification need have no hesitation in accepting the term, for he will 

 find himself in good company and with every incentive to do good 

 work. As a matter of fact some of our most distinguished botanists 

 have been only amateurs in this sense. The late Dr. George Engel- 

 mann, a skilled botanist and an authority on many difficult groups of 

 plants, was all his life a practicing physician. His botanical work 

 was accomplished in the midst of active professional life by snatching 

 a few minutes here and there while visiting, or waiting for the calls 

 of his patients. His notes and drawings were made on the backs of 

 prescription blanks, and as a mark of his indomitable energy it may 

 be added, they number more than 20,000, and fill sixty quarto vol- 

 umes. Our most distinguished authority on the difficult group of 

 willows, Mr. M. S. Bebb of Illinois, was a farmer. Other well known 

 students and authorities have been jurists, bank presidents, druggists, 

 teachers, railroad magnates, and in fact from almost all the walks of 

 professional and business life. They have studied botany as a recre- 

 ation. 



This all teaches that there is abundant room, and that the ama- 

 teur is welcome in botany. Let no one hesitate to take up the study 

 of plants as a pastime for the fear that he may not find a place for his 

 activity. He may perhaps not be able to discover as many species new 

 to science as when the country was newer, but the finding of new 

 species is not the sum total of botany, and even in this line much is 

 being done every year, as the long list of new species appearing in 

 the technical journals attests. There are problems in germination, 

 in physiology, in histology, in plant distribution, and a host of other 



