JUNE 12, 1902] 
NATURE 
155 
THE NEW BOTANICAL LABORATORIES AT 
LIVERPOOL. 
aN 
already announced, the new botanical laboratories, 
presented to University College, Liverpool, by Mr. 
W. P. Hartley, of Aintree, were formally opened on 
Saturday, May 10, by Sir William Thiselton-Dyer, 
K.C.M.G., F.R.S., Director of the Royal Botanic 
Gardens, Kew. The laboratories, of which a sketch 
elevation has already appeared in NATURE (vol. Iki. | 
p- 454, March 5, 1900), vie, both in size and equipment, 
with those of the University of Glasgow, opened last 
year by Sir Joseph Hooker. 
The building, which is plain and unpretentious 
externally, covers an area of 3000 square feet, and con- 
Fic. 1.—Hartley Botanical Laboratories, Liverpool. 
sists of three main floors, accommodating the museum, 
lecture theatre and elementary laboratory behind, whilst 
by the interpolation of two mezzanines facing the main 
thoroughfare, space is found for private rooms, research 
laboratories, herbarium, class room and workshops. All 
the rooms open off a central staircase, lit from a lantern 
in the roof, thereby avoiding waste of space in the pro- 
vision of corridors. A basement contains the store- 
rooms, lavatories and heating chamber ; the ground floor 
is occupied by the museum, museum preparation room 
and workshop. The first mezzanine carries the herbarium 
and class room, with an entrance to the gallery of the 
museum. On the first floor is placed the theatre, seated 
for two hundred students, the professor's private room 
with a private laboratory adjacent, and the departmental 
library. On the second mezzanine are placed the 
NO. 1702, VOL. 66] 
research laboratories and dark room, whilst the second! 
floor is occupied by the elementary laboratory, with 
accommodation for sixty-five students, the advanced: 
laboratory, arranged to seat twenty students, and the- 
assistant lecturer’s private room. 
The laboratories, museum and lecture rooms are 
fitted with pitch-pine and teak fixtures, and the building 
is lit throughout by electric light. All the laboratories,. 
both public and private, are equipped with gas and water 
fittings, and baywood wall cases are provided for storage 
of apparatus and materials. The total cost of the build- 
ing has been somewhat more than 13,000/., including the 
cost of the freehold and 750/. expended on museum glass 
and essential physiological apparatus. 
The opening ceremony took place in the arts theatre 
of the College, where a large audience was. 
presided over by Mr. E. K. Muspratt, vice- 
president of the College, in the unavoidable 
absence of the president, Lord Derby. 
Amongst other botanists present were Sir 
William Thiselton-Dyer, Profs. Marshall. 
Ward, Bretland Farmer, Weiss, Potter, Bot- 
tomley and Smith, and Mr. Wager. Sir 
Michael Foster, who expected to be present, 
was detained at the last moment by parlia- 
mentary business. Among the general guests 
were Sir John Brunner, M.P., Sir John 
Willox, M.P., Prof. Miller Thompson, Prof. 
Lord, &c. The principal was accompanied by 
a large number of the College staff. 
Mr. W. P. Hartley, in formally presenting 
the laboratories to the College, said that the 
citizens of Liverpool desired their city to be 
foremost, not only in commerce, but in know- 
ledge, in the discovery of truth and the en- 
couragement of science in its pure as well as 
inits applied branches. His object in provid- 
ing the laboratories to the College was to help 
in the realisation of that ideal. 
After the formal acceptance of the munifi- 
cent gift by the chairman and the principal 
of the College (Prof. Dale), a vote of thanks 
to the donor was carried by acclamation and 
responded to in suitable terms by Mr. Hartley. 
Sir William Thiselton-Dyer then delivered 
an address on the value of the study of botany 
as a means of cultivating the powers of 
observation and deduction from observed 
facts. He said his feeling in coming to the 
north from the metropolis was one of envy. 
He found a great commercial city full of 
busy life, possessing buildings and equipment 
for the pursuit of knowledge marked by a 
sumptuousness and magnificence the like of 
which was not possessed by them in London,,. 
and which they had little hope of obtaining. 
That grand municipal spirit existing among 
Liverpool citizens showed a height of local 
patriotism to which they had not attained in the 
metropolis. It was a lasting glory to her that Liverpool 
had undertaken so great a work, and he could not doubt 
that a blessing would come upon her citizens in the 
stimulus to that higher life the seeds of which they had 
planted. ; 
The new laboratories, as the generous donor had said,. 
were not intended to teach merely that which would lead 
to direct profit, they were intended also, and primarily, as. 
a centre for the prosecution of research and study not 
necessarily utilitarian in its aim. The study of botany 
was calculated to foster to the highest degree the faculties 
of observation and deduction. Bluntness of observation, 
was a national calamity, for the inability to see a thing 
at the moment it presented itself might mean the loss of 
a unique opportunity. Not in botany alone, but in all 
