190 
This building we are in is not as old as the Botanic Garden, but 
the enterprise in which we are engaged here was old before the 
Angles and Saxons conquered what is now Britain. We may 
truly regard the exercises of this evening as marking, for the 
moment, the apex of a course of events that began when Aristotle 
studied the plants of classic Greece, wrote several books on botany, 
and, at his death, endowed the “ botanic Barden” of Athens, of 
which his pupil, Theophrastus, was the first “ director.” 
Of course, the study of plants is older than that, for it was the 
botanist and pomologist, Adam, who gave to the plants of his 
garden their names, and he did this at Divine command. Next 
September there will be held in Holland an International Botanical 
ce ” 
Congress which will have, for one of its important and difficult 
tasks, the continuation of the work begun by Adam, namely, de- 
termination, 1f possible, of what the names of plants really are or 
should be. We are, at this instant, the end term of a great and 
glorious tradition, but tomorrow we shall be only a link in a chain 
that reaches out to the far distant future as well as backward to 
the past. 
Our slogan is “ For the advancement of botany and the service 
of the city.” We are, all of us, dependent every day of our lives 
on plant life for our food and our shelter, our heat and our light, 
our rubber-tired automobiles, and for much of the beauty of na- 
ture, without which life would not be worth living. 
A botanic garden is not only an asset to a city, 1t presents a 
wonderful and appealing opportunity for civic service and for 
helping to advance our knowledge, our culture, and our civiliza- 
tion. 
OFFICERS OF THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES 
PRESIDENT 
EDWARD C. BLUM 
TIRST VICE-PRESIDENT SECOND VICE-PRESIDENT 
WALTER H. CRITTENDEN ADRIAN VAN SINDEREN 

Tuirp VICE-PRESIDENT 
SUMNER FORD 
TREASURER SECRETARY 
EDWIN P. MAYNARD JOHN H. DENBIGH 
