NA TURE 



[December 23, 1909 



exertions. To provide for this support money is needed, 

 and studentships must be established in considerable 

 numbers, from the holders of which those who show that 

 they possess the gift of research can be selected and pro- 

 moted to higher posts in which their gift can find full 

 opportunity; but we want more than this — we want com- 

 pensation for those whom we have encouraged to make 

 the trial and who have failed to show that they possess 

 the gift, and an outlet by which they can emerge and find 

 work in practical life. 



This has been and is a difficulty in all schools of science, 

 for- many are called but few are chosen. The situation is 

 this : it is desirable that a large body of able young men 

 should be encouraged to take up scientific research, but 

 as experience has shown that only a small proportion of 

 them will possess the qualities by which success in research 

 can be attained, and as it is undesirable to encumber the 

 progress and the literature of science by a host of workers 

 who have no real capacity for research, it results that a 

 time will arrive when a great proportion of those whom 

 we ^ have encouraged to give some of the best years of 

 their life to this unremunerative work should be invited to 

 find other occupations. What is to be done? We cannot 

 throw them into the street. Some compensation must be 

 given. There are two ways in which this can be done. 

 One is the system of prize fellowships, which has for 

 long been in vogue at the old universities, and which it 

 has of late been the custom of those who have not really 

 studied the matter to decry. Nevertheless, it is a good 

 system, for it provides an income by which those who have 

 given some of the best years of their life to this trial of 

 their capacity can support themselves while they qualify 

 for taking part in a practical profession. 



\ prize fellowship system, or something like it, is a 

 necessary accompaniment of a university which induces 

 a large number of young men to follow for a time the 

 intellectual life ; it acts both as an inducement and a com- 

 pensation, and it would be a mistake and an injustice, in 

 my opinion, to abolish it ; but there is another way In 

 which the difficulty can be met, and that is the way which 

 has been adopted by the wise and far-seeing founders of 

 the Imperial College, namely, by the combination of a 

 school^ of science with a school of technology. If you 

 have incoiporated in your school of science a school' of 

 applied science, and if you at the same time take care that 

 none but able men are allowed to enter the research grade, 

 and if you establish, as you must do if you honestly work 

 your school, a connection with the great' industrial interest 

 of the country, you have all that is necessary for the dis- 

 posal of those men who, for whatever reason, find them- 

 selves unable to follow a life of pure science. As is well 

 known, the faculty for pure, apparently useless, research 

 in science is often possessed by men without anv aptitude 

 for practical application of science or desire of practical 

 success and the wealth which practical success brings, 

 while, on the contrary, manv minds of the highest order 

 cannot work at all without the stimulus of the thought of 

 the practical outcome of their labour. 



In our college there is room both for those with the 

 highest gifts for pure scientific research and for those 

 with the inventive faculty so important in the arts, or 

 yvith the knowledge and ability for controlling and organ- 

 ising great industrial enterprises; and, what is more, the 

 combination of the two types of mind in the same school 

 cannot but be of the greatest advantage to both, not only 

 on account of the atmosphere which will be created, so 

 favourable to intellectual effort, but also because good must 

 result from the contact in one school of minds whose ulti- 

 mate aim is to probe the mysteries of nature and to 

 acquire control over her forces. 



As Prof. Nichols has well said in pointing out the 

 dependence of technology on science :— " The History of 

 Technology shows that the essential condition under which 

 useful applications are likely to originate is Scientific pro- 

 ductiveness. A country that has many investigators will 

 have many inventors also. . . . Where .science is, there will 

 Its by-product technology be also. Communities having 

 the most thorough fundamental knowledge of pure science 

 will show the greatest output of really practical inventions. 

 Peoples who get their knowledge at second hand must be 

 ccnlent to follow. Where sound scientific conceptions are 

 NO. 2095, VOL. 82] 



the common property of a nation, the wasteful efforts of 

 the half-informed will be least prevalent." These are 

 .sound conclusions, and experience has shown that if the 

 terms are interchanged the same remarks may be made 

 with equai truth of the good influence which results to a 

 school of science from its association with a school of 

 technology. 



Before .concluding, it may be well to sav a word as to 

 the origin of the great imperial institution in the interests 

 of which we are met here to-day. It may justly be de- 

 scribed as the natural and necessary outcome of the scheme 

 for scientific instruction which was originated by that great 

 Prince whose memorial stands near the end of Exhibition 

 Road, and to whom science and art in England owe so 

 much. He dreamed a dream which his untimely death 

 alone prevented him from realising. Had he lived, who 

 can set a bound to what he would have achieved for science 

 pnd education in England? It is a most happy circum- 

 stance that the final stages of the realisation of that dream 

 should have been entered upon in the reign, and have re- 

 ceived the sympathy, patronage, and active support of his 

 great son, our most gracious King, who is working in so 

 many directions for the welfare and happiness of our 

 race. 



There is one further point I must toucli upon. In the 

 few remarks which I have had the honour to make to 

 you, I have endeavoured, however imperfectly, to embody 

 in words certain thoughts which bear upon a great subject. 

 I thank you for the patience with which you have heard 

 me. Whether I have produced the effect I desire I know 

 not, but I know this, that even if I had the tongue of 

 men and angois, no words of mine could have been so apt, 

 so expressive as the magnificent deed of Mr. Otto Beit 

 recorded in to-day *s new'spapers. It is impossible for me 

 to pass this over in silence, so closely is it connected with 

 the subject of my address. There are two ways of mani- 

 festing thought, by word and by action. Mr. Beit has 

 chosen tlie latter and far more effective way. We can only 

 express our respectful admiration and gratitude for his 

 generosity, and our thankfulness that a man should exist 

 among us with the power, the insight, and the true 

 humanity to do such a splendid deed. 



THE Af^ir DEPARTMENT OF BOTANY AT 

 UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, LONDON. 

 (~)^ Friday, December 17, the new botanical labora- 

 ^^ tories at University College, London, were formally 

 opened bv Dr. D. H. Scott, F.R.S., the Vice-Chancellor 

 of the University of London (Prof. M. J. M. Hill, F.R.S.) 

 presiding. Dr. Scott, in the course of a very interesting 

 address, said that botany has been more fortunate in that 

 college than in many others of more modern origin, for 

 the subject has always been recognised from the foundation 

 of the college as an independent science co-equal with 

 her sisters. In the long period from 1828 to the present 

 time there have only been three appointments to the chair, 

 viz. Profs. Lindley and Daniel Oliver, and the present 

 occupant. Prof. F. W. Oliver. After giving an out- 

 line of the history of the department and of his own 

 connection with it, Dr. Scott spoke of the various branches 

 comprised in the subject. Systematic botany is the oldest 

 branch, but it never can become old-fashioned. It is not 

 ne?ded less now than a century ago. At one time there 

 was a tendency to neglect it somewhat in favour of the 

 study of the structure and functions of some few plants 

 which have been favoured with selection as types. Now 

 the pendulum has swung the other way, and its import- 

 ance is fairly recognised in teaching. It would be 

 dis.astrous if systematic botany fell into neglect, and it 

 would be peculiarly discreditable to English people, because 

 systematic botany is specially a glory of this country. 



Referring to the Hookers, Bentham, C. B. Clarke, and 

 Daniel Oliver, Dr. Scott said it would appear to be a 

 characteristic that the ablest minds have been attracted 

 towards systematic botany. Comparative anatomy, he 

 said, is now pressed into the same service as systematic 

 botany. Comparative anatomy is particularly a study of 

 the modern English school. These two branches are now 

 subservient to questions of evolution, the search for re- 

 lationships having become identified with the attempt to 



