Section C— BACTERIOLOGY, BOTANY, ZOOLOGY, 

 AGRICULTURE, FORESTRY. PHYSIOLOGY, HY- 

 GIENE AND SANITARY SCIENCE. 



President OF THE Section : Professor H. H. W. Pearson, 

 M.A., Sc.D., F.L.S. 



WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 2. 



The President delivered the following address: — 

 A NATIONAL BOTANIC GARDEN. 



In these days of specialisation, to address a body of workers 

 representing the various departments of the Science in which 

 one is particularly interested, upon a subject on which one is 

 more or less qualified to speak, is a sufficiently formidable 

 undertaking. To be called upon to engage the interest and 

 attention of the representatives of the range of scientific activity 

 of which this Section takes cognisance — the vast field covered 

 by Bacteriology, Botany, Zoology, Agriculture, Forestry, 

 Physiology, Hygiene and Sanitary Science — is a task v/hich is 

 hardly less than appalling. When, therefore, the Council did 

 me the honour to place me in this position, the choice of a sub- 

 ject in which these few remarks should be centred presented 

 very serious difficulties. To ask you to listen to a discussion in 

 which not more than a small proportion of the members of this 

 section could pretend to be interested did not commend itself; 

 to attempt a review of cpiestions of predominant interest in 

 even a few of the sciences represented here was to commit the 

 offence of dealing with matters of which I know little or nothing. 

 I shall, therefore, make use of this exceptional opportunity 

 of appealing to so broadly constituted a body of workers in 

 biological science, to discuss a topic presenting few techni- 

 calities but, nevertheless, one of considerable National import- 

 ance, and one which I venture to hope will claim the interest 

 of every member of the section. 



The subject I have chosen is no new one; it has been before 

 the South African public on many occasions and in many guises. 

 But so far as I am aware it has never before been offered in 

 a more or less definite form for the consideration of a general 

 assembly of those who, by the character of their training and the 

 nature of their occupations, are especially concerned with the 

 scientific and economic development of the country, and it 

 has certainly never been discussed under circumstances in 

 which it is so likely to be favourably regarded as at present. 

 This meeting of the Association witnesses the consummation 

 of the Union of South Africa and, therefore, there could be no 

 more fitting occasion on which to advocate advances or reforms 

 calculated to benefit the country whose interests we have at 

 heart. 



I therefore invite von to consider with me the question of the 

 establishment of a National Botanic Garden. It is a subject of 

 such far-reaching importance to a Pastoral and an Agricultural 



