56 FLORA OF WASHINGTON AND VICINITY. 



garded as productive solely of evil, may be made an agency of good. 

 If, for examijle, it could become as much of a disgrace to be found 

 ignorant of the flora or fauna of one's native place as it now is to be 

 found ignorant of the rules of social etiquette or the contents of the 

 last new novel, devotees of botany and natural history would immedi- 

 ately become legion, and the woods and fields would be incessantly 

 searched for specimens and objects of scientific interest. It should be 

 the acknowledged work of educationalists to make science fashionable, 

 and call to their aid these powerful social sentiments in demanding the 

 recognition of its legitimate claims. 



Of all the natural sciences, that of botany is the most easily con- 

 verted into a branch of culture. Its objects appeal directly to the 

 highest esthetic faculties. It naturally allies itself with the arts of 

 drawing, painting, and sketching, and the deeper the insight into its 

 masteries the more strongly does it appeal to the imagination. Its pur- 

 suit, besides being the best possible restorer of lost, and i^reserver of 

 good health, is a perpetual source of the purest and liveliest pleasure. 

 The companionship of plants, which those who do not know them can- 

 not have, is scarcely second to that of human friends. The botanist is 

 never alone. Wherever he goes he is surrounded by these interesting 

 companions. A source of pure delight even where they are all famil- 

 liarly known to him, unlike those of his own kind, they grow in interest 

 as their acquaintance grows less intimate, and in all his travels they 

 multiply immensely his resources of enjoyment. The man of science 

 wonders what the unscientific can find to render travel a pleasure, and 

 it must be confessed that a great many tourists of both sexes go at the 

 behest of fashion, and care little more for Nature when crossing the Alps 

 than did Julius Caesar, who could only complain of the bad roads and 

 while away the hours in writing his grammatical treatise, De Analog ia. 

 While all forms of natural science, so far from paralyzing the esthetic 

 faculties, tend powerfully to quicken them, that of natural history, and 

 especially of botany, awakens such an interest in Nature and her beau- 

 tiful objects that those who have once tasted pleasures of this class may 

 well consider other pleasures insipid. 



But notwithstanding these attractions, which botany possesses above 

 other sciences, there exists among a small class of scientific men a dis- 

 position to look down upon it as lacking scientific dignity, as mere 

 pastime for school-girls or fanatical specialists. This feeling is most 

 obvious among zoologists, who, some of them, affect to disdain the more 

 humble forms of life and the simplicity of the tame and stationary plant. 



