54 PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. — SECTION C. 



It appears, therefore, that for Sotith African purposes the 

 £5,850 which Ceylon spends upon the more strictly botanical 

 work of its Botanic Gardens must be increased on account of 

 certani conditions peculiar to South Africa. But this sum 

 represents i-274th of the revenue. At the time of writing 

 there is no information as to the probable revenue of the Union. 

 In 1908 the total income of the four constituent provinces, with 

 Basutoland, less Railway receipts, amounted to £8,860,876. 

 On the scale which prevailed in Ceylon in 1906 this would have 

 yielded £32,000 for the support of a Botanic Garden. 



Such a system of South African gardens as has been sug- 

 gested above must, of course, be the result of a process of 

 growth; it could not come into existence at once as a finished 

 product. As it advanced beyond the initial stages, and its 

 activities and usefulness extended, the grants that would justly 

 be allocated to its work would naturally increase. Whether 

 the annual expenditure necessary to enable it to render 

 its maximum of service to the State is greater or less than 

 £32,000 can only be determined when we can be guided by 

 experience. 



The economic value of a State Department of Botany 

 organised upon a scientific basis and provided with adequate 

 equipment has been abundantly proved in all other important 

 parts of the Empire, tropical, sub-tropical and temperate. 

 What is probably the most efficient Botanic Garden at present 

 existing is maintained by the Dutch in Java; and perhaps the 

 most beautiful by the Republic of Brazil at Rio. The occupa- 

 tion of the Philippines by America has immediately resulted in 

 a great development of botanical- enterprise in those islands. 

 The continent of Africa is dotted with Gardens maintained, 

 partly or entirely for economic purposes, by Egypt, Germany, 

 Portugal and Great Britain. The accumulated experience of the 

 nations has found no other satisfactory means of doing the 

 work for which these gardens are established. If South Africa 

 is to proceed upon 'the soundest and most direct lines in in- 

 creasing, developing and preserving her agricultural and 

 pastoral resources, she must follow the example set by other 

 nations in the occupation or settlement of new or incompletely 

 known regions. 



Important as the commercial -aspect of this question un- 

 doubtedly is, South Africa cannot ignore another consideration 

 which does not exis't in most of the cases referred to above, 

 in which a new country has no immediate prospect of becoming 

 the permanent home of a people of European origin. The 

 South African Botanic Garden cannot be merely an economic 

 undertaking; it must also be an expression of the intellectual 

 and artistic aspirations of the New Nation whose duty it is to 

 foster the study of the country which it occupies, to encourage 

 a proper appreciation of the rare and beautiful with which 

 Nature has so lavishly endowed it. 



