82 REPORT OF THE CONFERENCE ON GENETICS. 
in this country before, have been very much surprised at the geniality 
and warmth and delicacy of it all. We have always heard much about 
your English homes, and we have been delighted to see them. We have 
also heard much about your landscapes, and now that we have seen them 
we shall carry away with us very pleasant memories of this gathering. 
At the close of that delightful evening to which we were invited by 
the Horticultural Club, a scientist of European renown, and whose fame 
extends even to the States, was heard to exclaim, “I had no idea the 
English were so pleasant! I am very glad I did come!” That is 
a sentiment which I am sure all of us who hail from a distance cordially 
re-echo :—“ I am very glad I did come.” 
Sir, we all trust that your kind and hospitable father and yourself and 
all the family will live long to enjoy this lovely home. 
Sir Albert Rollit, LL.D., said:—I have just been asked, as a member 
of the Council of the Royal Horticultural Society, and in the absence of 
our President, Sir Trevor Lawrence, to say a word on behalf of the British 
guests of Mr. Leopold de Rothschild, Dr. Erwin Smith having eloquently 
expressed those of our foreign visitors. We Englishmen really owe 
our host our twofold thanks—not only for the entertainment of ourselves, 
but for the splendid reception and English home-like hospitality which 
he has extended to all the members of this Conference, which the Society 
has organised, and to the success of which Mr. de Rothschild has so 
greatly contributed, thus making even more fruitful the most able and 
untiring efforts of our Secretary, who has done so much to assure success 
in both the scientific work and also in the pleasurable recreation of the 
members of the Conference. 
The Lucullan feast of ortolans and the flow of champagne has been 
splendid, and we are not like the Scotchman who, on his first visit to France, 
after tasting champagne, exclaimed, “ Saundie, I do-ant ca-are a-bout these 
French min-e-ral waters!’’ But this is the lesser part of the service 
Mr. de Rothschild has done to the Society and its guests, though it is to 
be hoped the day is far distant when, for the sake of good feeling and good 
fellowship, dining will cease to bea fine art, and hospitality become only an 
ancient virtue. What is even more valued, however, is such a courteous 
and kindly reception and welcome of Britishers and foreigners alike at 
one of our great English homes, and the opportunity of seeing its most 
beautiful gardens—surpassing even those of Damascus—its artistic 
treasures, and its princely hospitality. This is not, on such an occasion, 
a merely personal or national service; it is an international obligation. 
Such intercourse brings closer together the hearts and minds of mankind ; 
it broadens knowledge, thought, and feeling ; it awakens gratitude—which 
is the memory of the heart. More, it gives hope of that blessed time 
when men shall realise that they may do anything with bayonets—except 
sit upon them ; when the force of right shall supplant the right of force ; 
when the animosities shall perish, and the humanities only be eternal ; 
when the barriers shall fall down between nation and nation and be set . 
up only between right and wrong; when it may be said: 
The sheathed sword falls, 
And Peace, an Angel, folds her golden wings, 
And Commerce, smiling, calls. ” 
