66 



NA TURE 



[November 17, i< 



From this lable it will be M.en that, while the largest pro- 

 portion of capital expenditure in the county and non-county 

 ixjroughs, &c., is met by loans, the main source of supply of 

 the County Councils is still the Residue grant. The extent of 

 the assistance rendered by voluntary eflfon is also clearly 

 indicated, as well as that given by the Science and Art Depart- 

 ment ; the smaller urban districts appear to have received the 

 largest contributions from these two sources. 



THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION. 



BRISTOL MEETING. 



Section K (Botany). 



Opening Address by Prof. F. O. Bower, St. D., F.R.S., 



President of the Section. 



Shortly' before we met last year in the hospitable Dominion 



of Canada, two biologists, whose work relates to the questions I 



propose to discuss to-day, passed away. In both cases their 



services to science had received honourable recognition in this 



country. Johannes Japetus .Smith Steenstrup, who had been 



for more than thirty years a foreign member of the Royal 



Society, died June 20, 1S97, at the advanced age of eighty-four ; 



Julius von Sachs, also a foreign member of the Royal Society, 



died May 29, 1S97, aged sixty-five. 



The former of these, a zoologist, was probably best known in 

 this country for his work on " Alternation of Generations," a 

 translation of which was published by the Ray Society in 1845. 

 The title-page describes the phenomenon as "a peculiar form 

 of fostering the young in the lower classes of animals." Botanists 

 should remember that this term " alternation," which they often 

 use in a sense peculiarly their own, was originally applied to 

 the course of development in certain animals, by Chamisso in 

 1819. The first general statement of the subject from the zoo- 

 logical side was by Steenstrup in the work already named ; even 

 there no mention is made of such phenomena in plants, until 

 the concluding paragraph, where there is an allusion in very 

 general terms to the course of events in the life of seed-bearing 

 plants. But when we remember that it was only in 1S4S that 

 Suminski discovered the antheridia and archegonia borne upon 

 the prothallus of a Fern, we see plainly that Steenstrup could not 

 have used the term "alternation" in the sense in which it is 

 now generally applied to plants. The interest for us as botanists 

 will therefore be that Steenstrup suggested in his work on 

 alternation in animals how in the life of plants successive phases 

 exist, and that these are comparable to those which he described 

 in many animals. 



The work of Sachs, on the other hand, has influenced every 

 one of us. Some, including myself, have had the great advan- 

 tage of his direct personal guidance ; all must have derived 

 pleasure as well as profit from his writings. I shall not here 

 attempt any general summary of the achievements of this great 1 

 man, for that has been done efficiently by the scientific press at 

 large. I shall merely allude to one feature of his work, viz. 

 the style of its presentment to the reader. He was always clear, 

 usually concise. Me was, in addition to his power as an in- 

 vestigator, a master with the pencil, as well as with the pen. It 

 was this combination of qualities which made him the great 

 te.xt-book writer of his time. Never perhaps has a volume 

 more fairly reflected the position of a science at the moment 

 of its publication than did that of Sachs. It resembles the work 

 of a snap-shut camera, and, like any instantaneous photograph 

 of life in motion, it has fixed and perpetuatw'd awkward 

 positions. The morphological system of the time was stitT and 

 unpromising ; the text- book accurately depicted this, but it did 

 not suggest or anticipate future developments ; it did not bear 

 the softened image of a longer exposure ; it presents to us the 

 angular attitude of a moment. 



The powers of Sachs as a writer found their best scope in his 

 " History of Botany," a work which will always retain its value 

 as a masterly exposition of the results of very wide reading, 

 arranged with a literary skill which is unfortunately rare among 

 scientific men. I lay stress upon this power of Sachs as a writer, 

 apart from his record as an investigator, because he was strong 

 where so many of us are weak. The truth is that little efl'ort is 

 made by men of science to use a concise and transparent style ; 

 for the most part we write by the aid of such instincts as nature 

 has given us ; few cultivate comimsition. But it should, I 

 think, be impressed u|K>n the young aspirant that, when he 



NO. I 5 16, VOL. 59] 



writes, it is one of his first duties to consider his readers' l!bn- 

 venience ; he must use all endeavours to convey forcibly the 

 result of his inquiry, but to make the least possible demand upon 

 the patience of his readers. I should like to see certain papers 

 selected as models of construction, to be studied as such by all 

 candidates for our higher degrees ; we should naturally include 

 in the list those of the best masters of style in foreign languages, 

 and among them would rank the late Julius von Sachs. 



Three Phases of Morphological Study. '' 

 It will be in your memory that the Address of last jeai^s 

 Sectional President was largely devoted to branches of our 

 science which touch the material and economic interests of man. 

 It was pointed out to us how certain fungal diseases diminish 

 agricultural profits to an extent which may be estimated in 

 millions of pounds yearly. Beneficent microbes were also men- 

 tioned, such as those which govern the aroma and maturing of 

 butter and cheese ; these and many others, the study of which 

 lies properly within the province of botany, aftect not only the 

 health, but, at the most varied points, the comfort and prosperity 

 of mankind. 



It is unnecessary for me to dwell further upon these matters, Or 

 to urge again the utilitarian argument for the proper support of 

 botany. I propose, on the other hand, to invite your attention 

 this morning to the Morphology of Plants. This is a depart- 

 ment of science pure and simple. The results which it brings 

 have not, and cannot be expected to have, any money value in 

 the markets of the world. The present time is one of unusual 

 bustle and change in morphology, consequent upon the discovery 

 of new facts and the introduction of new methods. The de- 

 velopment of the study may be divided into three periods, we 

 ourselves standing upon the threshold of the third. The earliest 

 phase was that of description and delineation of what might be 

 observed of the mature form of plants ; this includes the work 01 

 the herbalists and of the earlier sy.stematists, who thus furnisheii 

 the basis for classification. It is true that the mere description 

 was enriched at times by comparisons made, but these often 

 took a capricious form, as is shown by the many curious allusions 

 which still survive in the nomenclature. Erasmus Darwin 

 satirised the imaginative comparisons indulged in by early 

 writers in his " Loves of the Plants " ; an instance of this is 

 seen in his lines referring to the legendary organism, hall 

 animal, half plant, suggested by the peculiar form of Dicispnia 

 {Cibotiwn) Batomelz : — 



" Cr.icll(;d in snow and fann'd by arctic air 

 Shines, ccntic Barometz, thy golden h.air. 

 Rooted in earth each cloven hoof descends. 

 And round and round her flexile neck she bends ; 

 Crops the gray coral moss, and hoary thyme, 

 Or laps with rosy tongue the melting rime. 

 Eyes with mute tenderness her distant dam, 

 Or seem^ to bleat, a Vcgetabk Lamb." 



The tendency to comparison thus already perceptible asserts 

 itself strongly in the next phase of our study, to which it gave 

 its character. And now the need arose for observing develop 

 ment ; this was initiated by Schleiden, and carried to a triumph 

 ant climax by Ilofmeister. Passing from the hands of thesi 

 pre-Darwinian to those of post-Darwinian writers, the com 

 parisons, while remaining virtually the same, received a new 

 significance. Observers now pushed their inquiries into thi 

 details of anatomical structure and development, and in man) 

 cases attached an importance beyond what is justifiable ti 

 minute similarities or diflierences of cell-cleavage. Thus wha: 

 might be called "cellular morphology " became a feature I'l 

 the period. It has, however, been in a measure discredited b} 

 the excessive zeal of some of its votaries, who drew large con 

 elusions from slight fads ; a salient example of this is furnishci' 

 by studies concerning segmentation of the ovum. But we mus' 

 not assume that because it has been pursued indiscreetly, the 

 study of segmentation is effete ; there is still scope for valuable 

 observation, which will bear a reasonable burden of argunieiit ; 

 though conclusions from such a source must be compared will, 

 those derived from oilier data, and a due estimate of them mus 

 be made accordingly. 



Morphology has lately passed to a third sLige — that of ex 

 periment — with a view to ascertaining the effect of external 

 agencies in determining form, and the limits of variability under 

 varied circumstances. Development of itself shows only how ' 

 part originates ; it does not demonstrate what it is, nor what 1 

 may become under special conditions. This new and growiri; 

 phase of experimental morphology, together with comparison 



