62 THE LIVING CYCADS 



words as Spirogyra, Erica, and Helichrysum, and that 

 translators seemed disappointed to find that scientific 

 names, hke Arabic numerals and musical notation, are 

 common to all languages. 



With the cycad collecting at an end, I came by rail to 

 Cape Town to take the boat for London and home. 



Educational institutions are well developed in South 

 Africa, there being excellent schools at Durban, East 

 London, Port Elizabeth, and particularly at Grahams- 

 town, where there is also a first-class conservatory of 

 music. But Cape Town, with the South African 

 College, the name of which has recently been changed 

 to the University of Cape Town, and with Stellenbosch 

 and Hugenot College within a short distance, is the chief 

 educational center. 



The department of botany in the University of 

 Cape Town had three teachers of international reputa- 

 tion, Professor H. H. W. Pearson, Dr. Edith Stephens, 

 and Mr. Walter Saxton, but Professor Pearson died in 

 the autumn of 191 7, and Mr. Saxton has gone to war, 

 so that only Dr. Stephens is left. The botanical labora- 

 tory is nearly as large as that at the University of 

 Chicago, and it is well equipped. 



Professor Pearson was deeply interested in establish- 

 ing a botanical garden on the slopes of Table Mountain, 

 and he had it well under way before he died. Plants 

 addressed to the garden are carried free by the railways 

 from any part of South Africa, and in consequence no 

 garden in the world has ever developed so rapidly. 

 Within three years all the known species of African 

 cycads had been sent in, some of them represented by 

 more than a score of specimens. Other plants are also 



