948 PARKS 



limited amount of information about plants. From the nature of the case, 

 this must always remain a prominent and valuable phase of botanical 

 instruction by gardens. In the early gardens the labels gave only the scien- 

 tific name of the plant, but subsequently there was added the common 

 name, the geographical distribution, and the place of the specimen in the 

 system of classification the family to which it belongs. 



So far, no attempt was made to illustrate any phase of botany but 

 classification such labels indicated the limits of information one might 

 obtain, but, as a rather modern development. Appearing first in this 

 country in the Missouri, Harvard and New York gardens, plantations were 

 organized on other bases, such as geographical distribution, relation to 

 environment (ecology), modification of parts (morphology), economic use, 

 both for food and medicine, plant breeding, and the history of botany. Thus 

 the range of information to be obtained from labels was greatly extended. But 

 after all, and at best, the result was for the most part only information 

 about plants, more or less detached and uncorrelated; not botanical edu- 

 cation. The general public visit a botanic garden for recreation rather than 

 information, and while these well-labeled plantings do a real service, and 

 meet with genuine and widespread appreciation, they leave much to be 

 desired. They would be justified, however, from the standpoint of educa- 

 tion, if they did no more than extend the interest of the public in things 

 botanical, or serve to give an added interest in life. 



2. Popular lectures. As an educational force in botanic gardens, 

 popular lectures are only second, in time of development, to the labeling 

 of the specimens. They were introduced as early as 1545 at the Padua 

 garden. At first they were no doubt largely confined to the medicinal 

 properties of plants, illustrated by living specimens from the garden and 

 greenhouses and by dried specimens from the herbarium. Later they have 

 been extended to all phases of scientific botany, from the early spring 

 flowers to botanical exploration and theories of heredity. The introduction 

 of the stereopticon has here, as elsewhere, done much to increase the interest 

 in such lectures. 



3. Research. Botanic gardens, in the true sense of the word, have 

 always been centers of investigation; otherwise they tend to become merely 

 pleasure parks. The educational work of the early physic gardens was very 

 largely research, while practically no attention was given to popularizing. 

 Thus, when John Gerarde, in the latter part of the seventeenth century, 

 acting for Lord Burleigh, prepared the letter to Cambridge University 

 recommending that a physic garden be established there, the purpose stated 

 was to encourage 'the facultie of simpling, ' and the gardens of Bologna, 

 Montpellier, Leyden, Paris and Upsala (the seat of Linne's labors) flour- 

 ished in the middle of the seventeenth century for the primary purpose of 

 aiding teaching and research. Well-equipped garden laboratories for 

 research are becoming more and more common, especially in gardens 

 organically connected with, or affiliated with colleges and universities. 



4. Publications. At first these were mainly confined to catalogues of 

 the living plants; then were introduced guides to the grounds, seed lists, 



