BOTANICAL GARDENS OF JAMAICA — MAXON. 535 



It is scarcely necessary to say anything in Jamaica about the importance 

 generally of botanic gardens, for the need for them has been continuously 

 recognized here for more than 100 years. The value of those existing in 

 Jamaica, Trinidad, and Demerara is so evident that lately botanic gardens 

 have been started in Antigua, Dominica, Montserrat, and St. Kitts Nevis, 

 among the Leeward Islands ; in Grenada, St. Lucia, and St. Vincent, 1 among 

 the Windward Islands ; and still more recently in British Honduras. 



Botanic gardens in the Tropics do the work, on the plant side, of agricultural 

 departments in temperate climates. They are in themselves experimental sta- 

 tions and are much more efficient in introducing new cultural products, and in 

 distributing plants and imparting useful information, than most agricultural 

 departments. 



The tropical botanical gardens established by the British through- 

 out their colonies are in close relation to each other, both directly 

 and through Kew, to which they look for assistance and advice. 

 They are "not isolated, but are branches of an agricultural de- 

 partment as wide as the British Empire itself." Their benefit to 

 the Empire and its dependent peoples and to the world at large has 

 been, literally, incalculable. Knowing this to be true, and realizing 

 however imperfectly the enormous amount of exploratory and cul- 

 tural work still to be done in furthering the production of tropical 

 foods and raw economic materials of many kinds upon which the 

 civilized world is increasingly dependent, may we not hope that the 

 first activities of the newly organized Institute for Research in 

 Tropical America will be directed toward the establishment of ade- 

 quate botanical gardens in all the possessions of the United States 

 within the Tropics ? 



Photographs shown in plates 12 and 13 were courteously contributed by the 

 New York Botanical Garden ; the others, with a single exception, were made by 

 Mr. G. N. Collins, of the Bureau of Plant Industry, United States Department of 

 Agriculture. 



X A revival of a botanic garden established in 1765. 



