November 6, 1919] 



NATURE 



26- 



BRiriSH BOTANIC GARDENS AND 

 STATIONS. 



A MARKED feature of the Scientific activities of 

 •^*' tiie past fifty years has been the extensive estab- 

 lishment throughout the British Empire of botanic 

 gardens and botanic stations. The history of such 

 institutions is a long one; it taltes us bacic to the 

 time of the Pharaohs. It is also wide ; the Spaniards 

 found, in the Mexico they devastated, establishments 

 of this nature conducted with as much enlightenment 

 and on as elaborate a scale as any then to be met with 

 in Eurof)e. 



The motives underlying the creation of such gardens 

 have varied at different times and in different countries. 

 Up to the middle of the sixteenth century the scope 

 of European botanical gardens was mainly confined 

 to the technical task of illustrating as fully as possible 

 what were believed to be the sources of classical 

 simples. During the next hundred years this was ex- 

 tended so as to include such aesthetic and economic 

 novelties as could be made to grow. But by the 

 middle of the eighteenth century, when the Royal 

 Garden at Kew (1759), and the Botanic Garden at 

 St. Vincent in the West Indies (1764), were founded, 

 the purpose of botanical collections had become largely 

 limited to the assemblage of plants interesting because 

 of their rarity. 



Presently a healthy reaction against this rather 

 narrow outlook arose, for we find the historical 

 memorandum by Lt.-Col. Kyd, to which the establish- 

 ment of the famous institution at Calcutta was due 

 (1786), advocating "the propriety of establishing a 

 botanical garden, not for the purpose of collecting rare 

 plants (although they also have their uses) as things 

 of mere curiosity or furnishing articles for the grati- 

 fication of luxury, but for establishing a stock for 

 disseminating such articles as may prove beneficial to 

 the inhabitants as well as to the natives of Great 

 Britain, and which ultimately may tend to the exten- 

 sion of the national commerce and riches." Already 

 Sir Joseph Banks, with his practical mind, had made 

 representations to the same effect with regard to Kew, 

 urging the utilisation of the Royal Garden as a central 

 institution where information regarding the vegetation 

 of the globe and its economic uses could be accumu- 

 lated; where useful plants from all quarters could be 

 raised ; and whence such plants could be distributed to 

 the overseas possessions of the Crown. Before the 

 close of the first generation of the nineteenth century, 

 many important establishments of the kind had been 

 provided; among these we may note the gardens at 

 Peradeniya in Ceylon, Saharunpur in North-West 

 India, Singapore and Penang in Malaya, Buitenzorg 

 in Java (during the brief occupation of that island by 

 the English), Trinidad in the West Indies, and Sydney 

 in Australia. 



The conversion of Kew into the national botanic 

 garden for this country (1841) gave a new impetus to 

 this salutary activity, and under the active guidance 

 of three eminent directors— Sir W. J. Hooker (1841-65) 

 Sir J. D. Hooker (1865-85), and Sir W. T. Thiselton- 

 Dyer (1885-1905)— the tradition established by Banks 

 was vigorously sustained. To this impetus we may 

 attnbute the establishment of the famous gardens of 

 Melbourne (1846), Durban (1850), Adelaide (1855), 

 Brisbane (1855); and Jamaica (1857), though in the 

 last case the inability of the local legislature to appre- 

 ciate the value of science ensured for the garden the 

 fate which had befallen that founded a century 

 earlier in St. Vincent. The great services rendered by 

 Kew to all forms of botanical enterprise have been 

 nowhere more manifest than in the training of those 

 who have proceeded to everv quarter of the globe 

 NO. 2610, VOL. 104] 



to take charge of the botanic gardens and stations 

 throughout the Empire. 



Since 1869, when Nature was founded, the activities 

 in this direction have continued unimpaired. In 1870 

 the botanic garden at Wellington in New Zealand was 

 founded. In 1871 the abandoneil Jamaica garden was 

 re-estabhshed and another was created in Bermuda. 

 In 1879 an important botanic garden was founded at 

 Georgetown, in British Guiana. 



Between 1886 and 1890 the botanic garden at St 

 Vincent, which had long been allowed to lie in abey- 

 ance, was restored, and new botanic stations were 

 opened in the islands of Barbados, Dominica, Grenada 

 St. Lucia, and the smaller islands. The last station 

 to be established in this region was that of British 

 Honduras (1892). Profiting by the experience gained 

 in the West Indies, attention was directed to Africa 

 and Kevv has been instrumental in the establishment 

 of botanic stations in our West African Colonies 

 at Lagos (1887), Aburi in the Gold Coast (1890), 

 Old Calabar (1893), Sierra Leone (1895), and 

 Kaduna in Northern Nigeria (1914). In East Africa 

 the need for a botanic station in Nvasaland was 

 urged by the authorities at Kew, and as a result 

 that at Zomba was founded in 1891. This was 

 followed by the establishment of the botanic garden 

 at Entebbe in Uganda in 1898. The urgency of the 

 need for such an institution in the East Africa Pro- 

 tectorate it has, for some reason, been more difficult 

 to persuade the authorities concerned to realise. But 

 at last (1918) the beginnings of such an institution as 

 has long been called for have been created at Nairobi. 

 Ihe Government of the Sudan, with a keener appre- 

 ciation of the value of science. lost no time in estab- 

 lishing a botanic garden at Khartum and a botanic 

 station at Jebelin. 



Notable additions to the list of botanic gardens were 

 those founded at Hong Kong in 1871, and at Aberdeen 

 in 1897. But the most important of the creations of 

 recent years is that of a great national botanic garden 

 oL,'7o th°'''',- ^fPeTown, in ,913. This l:ience 



thTrJn?nn nflJ'H^^r/^ ^*^''°" °^ ^^^ Government of 

 the^ Union of South Africa, and to the untiring advocacv 



doi IT/.T-" ft ^^''.^'^f- P^^^^"- This institu. 

 4M.O T' ° ^'"""^ '" "'"'^ *f^« "K^^^ " of South 

 Africa, and gives promise to be one of the most in 

 teresting and valuable scientific gardens in the world. 



I 



THE SCIENTIFIC AND TECHVICAT 

 DEPARTMENT OF THE IMPERI4T 

 INSTITUTE. iMi-£-KiAi. 



N furtherance of its principal object of promoting 

 the utilisation of the resources of the Emo rf 

 and in order to supplement its other activitfes in thk 

 f<fc;l'nTfi"''.''"Pr?' ^"^*'t"'« established in 1896 

 Hon n? P f"w''?t.""=^' department under the direo 

 tion of Prof. Wyndham Dunstan. The history of The 

 formation of that department and of its work in earlv 

 v^ars was told by the late Sfr Frederick Abel, at that 

 time Director of the Imperial Institute, in the preface 



nublisZn' .".! '■"^'^''''^ r«P°^*^ «"d scientific Sers 

 ft w I hP Z .uTlu'": '" '^°-''- P™"^ that account 

 It w II be seen that the inception of scientific work at 



Tsc? FvMhV ""'' \T *.^ '^°>'^' Commission of the 



oS of ^t, r^^ ?• T-*"'"' '^"^ '"*" Lord Plavfair was 

 one of Its most active supporters. 



invesL^^'"'iP'*',PK'^°'^ °^ ^^^ department was to 

 mvestigate by laboratory researches and technical 

 trials raw materials, and especiallv those derived from 

 the Empire overseas, as the first steo in their com- 

 mercial utilisation. The work of "the department 



