192 The Evolution of Botany. 



countries in this respect. Prof. "W. G. Farlow, in a paper 

 read before the American Society of Naturalists, candidly 

 confesses that American botanists are not up to the Euro- 

 pean in original research. This, he thinks, is not due to 

 lack of talent, qualification, or inclination among our bota- 

 nists for research, but he attributes it rather to lack of op- 

 portunity. Those most eminently fitted are for the most 

 part teachers, and in this country the demands upon the 

 teacher are such that but little time and strength is left 

 from the duties of teaching to carry on original researches. 

 In Germany the greater part of the work of laboratory in- 

 struction is committed to assistants, while the professors 

 are free to carry on important investigations which advance 

 scientific knowledge and give luster to the institutions to 

 which they belong. In America there is no due appreci- 

 ation of the importance of endowing scientific research ; 

 hence the problems that ought to be solved by American 

 botanists are left to be solved by Germans or other Euro- 

 peans, working at a great disadvantage. Efforts should be 

 made to create public sentiment favoring the endowment of 

 original research. 



Botanical investigations and researches are continuing in 

 the various departments, the morphology, anatomy, and 

 physiology of plants receiving the greatest attention. The 

 theory of evolution ; the laws governing the growth of the 

 various organs and their deviation from the normal pattern ; 

 the molecular structure of the constituents of plant cells ; the 

 influence of environment upon plants ; the intimate study of 

 the fructification of the ovary ; the application of chemistry 

 to the determination and separation of the active medicinal 

 constituents ; the laws of heredity and variation ; the circum- 

 scribed areas for certain plants and causes ; the migration of 

 plants, both terrestrial and celestial, and its causes ; habita- 

 tion in relation to composition, structure, and heredity ; the 

 relation of insects and plants to color and form ; geological 

 distribution compared to modern movements of plants, etc. 

 are subjects of present attention. A like activity is mani- 

 fested in the study of the lower orders, of the fungi espe- 

 cially, and extensive work is being done in microscopical 

 botany generally, including bacteriological botany. 



The study of the diseases of plants and their treatment 

 plant pathology especially of the cultivated and useful 

 ones, and plant teratology (the study of malformations and 

 monstrosities), are also receiving detailed attention, and 



