DEVELOPMENT OF BOTANY IN NEW YORK CITY. 1 9 I 



for children. Courses of spring and fall lectures on botanical 

 subjects for adults, open to the public without charge, have been 

 a feature of the work of the New York Botanical Garden from 

 the beginning. 



In the spring of 1905 a new feature in the educational work 

 was inaugurated by the organization of a course of lectures on 

 nature study subjects to the public school pupils of the fourth and 

 fifth grades. The experiment proved so successful that the ar- 

 rangement was continued during the fall months and again this 

 spring. 



Twice each week, on Tuesday and Fridays, lectures were given 

 by various members of the garden staff to audiences numbering 

 from five hundred to over eight hundred pupils from the fourth 

 and fifth grades. 



The grades were taken separately, and the pupils were accom- 

 panied by their teachers. The lectures were amply illustrated by 

 lantern views, and at the close the pupils were divided into groups 

 of convenient size and taken by competent demonstrators to the 

 collections, both indoors and out on the plantations, where the 

 subject of the lecture was more full}- illustrated. 



By this means the pupils of a crowded metropolis are not only 

 brought face to face with the facts of nature, but are given a 

 breadth of view quite beyond the possibilities of the class room 

 alone to confer. 



The following were the subjects of the lectiuxs this spring: 

 Before Grade 5B — I., Woody plants and plants without wood; 

 Protection of trees in cities. II., Industries depending on for- 

 ests; Plant products. III.. Classification of plants. Before Grade 

 4 B — I., Cultivation of plants. II., Seedless plants. 



There has been in bloom at the Xew York Botanical Garden 

 a remarkable plant known as Queen A^ictoria's Agave, the stem 

 of which is out of all proportion to the body of the plant. The 

 latter is fifteen inches high. Above this, the stem extends for 

 ten feet, making a total of eleven feet three inches, the upper 

 four feet and a half of which was covered with flowers. 



