218 LEADING AMERICAN MEN OF SCIENCE 



/ his publications would give no adequate impression of Asa Gray 

 ( as an inspiring teacher, a keen and kindly critic, and a bright and 

 ) genial companion. Such impressions come only from personal 

 \ contact, but they go to make up the appeal to affection ; and in the 

 / case of Professor Gray they accounted in no small way for his 

 I hold upon American botanists. 



Reference has been made to the fact that Gray's scientific repu- 

 tation during his life was perhaps greater in Europe than in 

 America, for his real scientific colleagues were chiefly in Europe. 

 Now that American botany has developed a larger perspective, 

 some unprejudiced estimate of Gray's place in the science may be 

 made by an American botanist. During the period of Gray's 

 botanical activity, the science of botany in the United States con- 

 sisted almost exclusively of the determination of its flora. The 

 Atlantic states had been explored in a general way, and enough 

 was known to justify the publication of a few manuals. Isolation 

 from Europe, however, where the types were stored, had filled 

 these manuals with incorrectly determined plants. But the flora 

 of the much greater west remained practically unknown. Public 

 and private enterprise had organized exploring expeditions that 

 touched this flora slightly, and scattered reports contained de- 

 scriptions of many plants. In short the flora of North America 

 was partly in confusion and more largely unknown when Gray 

 began his work. His mission was to organize this chaotic material 

 into some orderly form, clearing away confusion, bringing together 

 scattered and often ill-considered publications, and establishing 

 American systematic botany upon a secure foundation. His was 

 the first serious and successful attempt to grasp the flora of the 

 whole continent and relate it properly to all previous publications. 

 It may be said that American systematic botany as a definite organ- 

 ized science, rather than a mass of isolated, sporadic efforts, dated 

 from the work of Asa Gray. To appreciate this fact, one has only 

 to compare the condition of systematic botany in America before 

 and after Gray. In his chosen subject, therefore, Gray stands 

 for its permanent transformation in America. 

 Work on the Flora of North America was pushed forward 



