BIOLOGY 



is, as I have already hinted, a very debatable 

 question, but all are agreed that pure and applied 

 science must remain in close organic connection 

 with one another. I have often thought how- 

 delightful it would be if we could have an institu- 

 tion or a society devoted entirely to the encourage- 

 ment of useless investigations, but I fear that is an 

 ideal which will never be attained in this utilitarian 

 world. 



When I say * useless,' of course you will 

 understand that I am being guilty of a terminolo- 

 gical inexactitude. I ought to say, investigations 

 that appear useless to those who know no better. 



Let me give you just one example. We are 

 told by Professor Hermann Miiller that it was not 

 until the close of the eighteenth century that the 

 true purport and significance of flowers began to 

 be perceived. Christian Conrad Sprengel then 

 laid the foundations of our knowledge concerning 

 the processes of fertilisation, and pointed out the 

 important part played by insects in carrying pollen 

 from one flower to another. Now Charles Darwin, 

 in one of his classical works, tells us that he heard 

 from a New Zealand correspondent that the clover 

 in that country never seeded because there were 

 no humble-bees to carry the pollen. When I was 

 in New Zealand some twenty years ago, however, 

 I was informed on excellent authority that the 

 clover-seed raised in the province of Canterbury 



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