TRANSACTIONS 



BOTANICAL SOCIETY. 



NEW Ya;^K 



SESSION XLIV. ^tank:al 



IStJi November 1879.— Dr T. A. G. Balfour, President, 

 in the Chair. 



The Chairman delivered the following valedictory 

 address : — 



Gentlemen, — In resigning this chair, to wliich you did 

 me the honour of electing me two years ago, I intend to 

 deliver no formal address, but, as our obituary list during 

 the past year has, I am sorry to say, been unusually large, 

 to confine myself almost exclusively to giving a sketch of 

 the lives of the deceased, especially as some of these have 

 held the foremost ranks in botanical science. I cannot, 

 however, omit taking some notice of a lecture delivered in 

 this city about three weeks ago, in which botany as a part 

 of medical education was virtually declared to be worse 

 than useless. It would be preposterous in me, in address- 

 ing you, gentlemen, who know the value of that science so 

 well, to occupy much time in replying to such a charge ; 

 but a few remarks seem called for on the present occasion. 



I always thought that the grand feature of medical 

 education in our day was the raising of its standard; and 

 that the preliminary examinations recently introduced were 

 for this very purpose, viz., to secure that no imperfectly 

 educated person should find admission into the medical 

 profession. On the same principle the wisdom of our fure^ 



TRAXS. BOT. SOC. VOT., XIV. A 



