137 



THE TWENTIETH CENTURY BOTANY. 



Extract from an Address* by Dr. B. T. Galloway, Chief of tlie Bu- 

 reau of Plant Industry, U.S. Department of Agriculture. 



The experience of the old world in the matter of botanic gardens is 

 such as would suggest caution in any attempt to emulate what has 

 been accomplished there. Representative collections of living plants 

 are highly important and valuable, but in bringing them together the 

 fact should not be lost sight of that botany can in the future be ad- 

 vanced by giving more heed to the aesthetic side of the work than 

 has been done in the past, that is. assuming that collections of living 

 plants are for study and general educational effect, much of their value 

 in both directions may be lost by adhering too closely to rigid systems. 

 Collections meeting every requirement for study and having great 

 value in a general educational way will probably be maintained in 

 what is more likely to be a natural system. Such collections can, 

 moreover, be maintained at much less expense than the stereotyped 

 ones, and will do much to bring the science of botany home to large 

 numbers of peop'e who can appreciate a bit of lovely landscape, but 

 can see nothing in the little plots and formal labels so suggestive of 

 cemeteries In other words, it seems to me that the old idea of bo- 

 tanical collections with small groups of plants representing certain 

 systems of botanical nomenclature, or certain systems of botanical 

 grouping, will give pL.ce to natural gardens where may be grouped 

 herbaceous, shrubby and other plants in such a way as to appeal to 

 the mind through I' e eye. Unquestionably a much greater apprecia- 

 tion of botany and botanical work can be brought about by gardens of 

 this kind, and it is believed that great encouragement will be made in 

 the matter of their development at educational institutions wherever 

 opportunity affords. 



In morphology and physiology we shall expect to see more and 

 more important problems worked out by experimental methods. Less 

 att' ntion will be given to the mere accumulation of facts without pro- 

 per ct) -ordination. The value and importance of experimental mor- 

 phology are already beginning to be realized ; that is, experimental mor- 

 ptiology from the standpoint of work on plants in t^eir natural envi- 

 ronment rather than under laboratory conditions. I'he same is true of 

 physiology In the past our knowledge of plant physiology has been 

 largely based on laboratory work and studies of one or more in- 

 dividual plants. From such data broad generalizations have been 

 made, which, as time has shown, have in many cases been erroneous. 

 In other words, it has been found unsafe and unreliable to base gene- 

 ralizations in the matter of the life processes of plants on laboratory 

 experiments alone. The physiology of ti^e future will undoubtedly 

 pay more heed to the broader questions of plant life in their relation 

 to environment and their adaptation in general to surrounding con- 

 ditions. In other words, ecology in its broad sense is to be an impor- 

 tant factor in the future study of plants. In the past we have had a 

 school of scientific workers arise and endeavour to demonstrate that 

 the growth of plants is controlled in large measure by the chemical pro- 



*Science, II, 19 ; 1 Jan., 1904. 



