The most extensive employer of young botanists in America is 

 the United States government, and we are very reUably informed 

 that the various bureaus of the Department of Agriculture are 

 in positive need of more men adequately trained in plant mor- 

 phology and physiology than they can find. Such training is 

 usually sufficiently well attained in two or, at most, three years 

 of graduate study. 



It is becoming increasingly difficult to differentiate between 

 botanists pure and simple and special students of agriculture. 

 Yet we are loath to lose good men through a mere juggling of 

 terms, as botanist into agronomist or something like, even 

 though the latter cashes in better. So, among present-day op- 

 portunities in botany should not be overlooked the one of being 

 botanist in fact only, with sedulous advoidance of a name which 

 suggests nothing of the large cash values upon which this sec- 

 tion of the profession, under its many aliases, may justly pride 

 itself. 



For teachers of botany the market is still brisk, though the 

 upward tendency is not perhaps so marked as in other lines of 

 demand. Doctors of philosophy in botany are commanding be- 

 ginning salaries in teaching positions which average about fifty 

 per cent, more than those offered eight years ago. There are in 

 the main, of course, positions of collegiate or equivalent rank. 

 It is for teachers of lesser training that the demand has shown 

 a barely perceptible falling off. But this is more than offset 

 by the increasing demand for teachers of agriculture for the rural 

 high schools. What botany in some quarters is threatened with 

 losing as a high school subject, agriculture has already more 

 than gained. Since the question has become very largely one of 

 teaching much the same subject in a more efficient way, we may 

 eixpect that botany, in this respect, will be a graceful loser. 

 In the Philippines a "practical" botanist is wanted in every 



