1896 } BOTANICAL OPPORTUNITY 207 
almost anywhere as to accomplish its purpose, a serial publica- 
tion ought to be started only when there is reasonable probability 
that it will persist for a considerable length of time. Granting 
this probability, a research institution with adequate funds forms 
one of the most satisfactory and effective agencies of publica- 
tion, since it can place its proceedings or reports in all of the 
principal libraries of the world, a thing which the journals do 
not always accomplish; and not only can it thus amplify its field 
legitimately, but almost of necessity it must assume the duty of 
publication if it is to accomplish the greatest results possible 
from its direct investigation. 
One has only to pass a short time in the library of one of 
the larger scientific institutions to be convinced that a great deal 
of activity is manifested in the botanical world. Each month 
and each week bring many additions to the literature of the 
science, and so numerous, varied, and widely scattered are these 
contributions, that one feels the greatest hesitancy in publishing 
on even the most restricted subject, lest others should have 
antedated his discoveries. Yet notwithstanding the variety 
and number of botanical publications, and the great progress 
which is undeniably made every year, it is a matter of frequent 
comment that the progress made is by no means so much 
greater than that of our predecessors as might be expected, con- 
sidering the greater advantages under which work is prosecuted 
today. While it must be borne in mind that the seizing of the 
general features of a landscape is far easier than the working 
out of its detailed topography, that the outlining of the field 
of botany or of its principal divisions could not fail to proceed 
more rapidly, even under unfavorable conditions, than the elab- 
Oration of the details of the many specialties into which it is 
now broken up, so that less prompt and voluminous results are 
naturally to be expected now than a generation ago, there is 
reason to question whether the present returns cannot be 
increased. How to secure the greatest possible results from the 
large number of trained men holding or soon to hold salaried 
_ Positions, and from the large equipment in laboratories, libra- 
